Report on the Functioning of Andhra Pradesh Information Commission

 Preliminary Findings

Report on the Functioning of

Andhra Pradesh Information

Commission

By

United Forum for RTI Campaign - Andhra Pradesh & LibTech India

Study Coordinators:

Chakradhar Buddha & Kagga Venkata Krishna

Study Team Members :

Anand A, Akshit Arora, Kruti Biren Shah, K Vamsi Bhushan & Ranadheer Malla

Email: a p.ufrti@gmail.com Mobile: 92465 22344

16th April, 2021

Introduction

The state and central I nformation commissions are constituted under the Right To I nformation

(RTI) Act 2005 to facilitate and safeguard the rights accorded to citizens under the Act.

Government of Andhra Pradesh(AP) has constituted Andhra Pradesh I nformation Commission to

exercise the powers conferred on and to perform the functions assigned to i t under Right to

Information Act, 2005.

Andhra Pradesh I nformation Commission i s a quasi-judicial body that decides the Complaints and

Second Appeals filed under RTI. The j urisdiction of the Commission extends over all Andhra

Pradesh State Public Authorities. Some of the i mportant powers of the I nformation commission

include the power to require public authorities to provide access to i nformation, appoint Public

Information Officers ( PIOs), publish certain categories of i nformation etc.. Section 19(8)(b) of the

RTI Act empowers commissions to “require the public authority to compensate the complainant

for any l oss or other detriment suffered”. Further, under section 19(8) and section 20 of the RTI

Act, they are given powers to i mpose penalties on erring officials, while under Section 20(2),

commissions are empowered to recommend disciplinary action to the appropriate government

against a PIO for “persistent” violation of one or more provisions of the Act. Effective functioning

of i nformation commissions i s crucial for proper i mplementation of the Act and this has been

reiterated by the Hon’ble Supreme Court i n the j udgement W.P.(C) No.-000436 / 2018, “Anjali

Bharadwaj and others VS Union of I ndia and others” delivered on February 15, 2019 as well.

Back Ground:

After the bifurcation of the state i n June 2014, both the states of A.P and Telangana have a

common I nformation Commission functioning till September, 2017 operating from Hyderabad.

With the constitution of Telangana i nformation commission i n September 2017, AP has l eft with no

information commission.

As per Schedule 10, of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014, a separate I nformation

commission was to be constituted for AP but only i n l ate 2018, Andhra Pradesh state i nformation

commission ( SIC) was constituted, that too under the direction from the apex court. Based on the

directions of the Supreme Court, as on today 6 commissioners were appointed - 3 i n October

2018, 1 i n May 2019 and the l ast 2 i n July 2020. The vacant post of Chief i nformation

commissioner has been filled up as recently as July 2020.

Effectively Andhra Pradesh state has functioned without i nformation commission for the l arge

part so far, post state bifurcation. I n this context we want to understand the functioning of the

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newly formed State I nformation Commission and as a follow up we plan to do a series of studies

to monitor the i mplementation of the RTI Act i n the state of AP.

Objective of the study:

The objective of the current study i s to monitor the functioning of Andhra Pradesh I nformation

commission so that i t will l ead to overall i mprovement i n the performance of the I nformation

commission as a body, commissioners and strengthening the i mplementation of the act.

We made an attempt to analyse the quality of orders passed by the i nformation commissioners,

time taken for the final orders of the second appeal received by the commission, completeness

of the order and i t’s compliance with the RTI act. Additionally, i f the PIO i s found to have acted

against the l aw, whether they were assessed/ taken to task as per the act.

Methodology:

This report findings are based on the analysis of randomly chosen 769 orders of Andhra Pradesh

Information commission for the period of February 2019 to November 2020. We sampled these

769 orders from the SIC orders and made sure that orders by all the i nformation commissioners

are covered i n the study.

Number of cases and disposed

As of January 2021, Andhra Pradesh I nformation Commission received 9,786 appeals and 4,186

complaints of them 7,256 & 2,754 are disposed respectively. 3,962 of all the appeals or

complaints received are pending at the state i nformation commission. Table 1 shows the number

of appeals/ complaints received, disposed and pending along with other details.

Table 1: Number of appeals/ complaints disposed and the Penalty i mposed by the commission

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S

No

Duration

No of Appeals/ Complaints

Penalty

Imposed

Awarded to

Received Disposed Pending Applicant

1 01.10.2017

To May 2019 5,000 422 4,578

₹ 25,000 ₹ 15,000

2 June 2019 to

May 2020 5,590 5,808 4,507

₹1,98,000 ₹ 26,500

3 June 2020 to

January 2021 3,351 3,780 3,962

₹ 0 ₹ 0

From unconfirmed reports, we got to know that there are about 10,000 cases that are transferred

to the AP SIC, which were parked with Telangana SIC before the formation of AP SIC and only

7000 of these cases are accepted by the AP SIC for unspecified reasons. Note that the

transferred cases are not i ncluded i n the total number of pendings cases i n table 1.

Preliminary Findings:

1. Time Taken to Dispose an Appeal/ Complaint

On average the State I nformation Commission took more than 273 days to dispose of an appeal/

complaint registered with the SIC i .e the number of days between the data of appeal/complaint

received at the SIC to the date of disposal. Of the 769 orders analysed, the maximum number of

days taken by the SIC to dispose of an appeal/ complaint was 866 days and the minimum days i s

about 15 days.

There are 3962 cases ( 2530 appeals + 1432 complaints) pending at the SIC as of January, 2021.

On average SIC disposed of a l ittle more than 519 cases i n the l ast six months at this rate i t will

take more than 7 and a half months to dispose of the pending cases and i f we i nclude the

transferred cases from Telangana SIC i t will take more than 21 months.

People approach the SIC as they didn’t receive the requested i nformation ( or on time), i f the SIC

itself takes months to dispose of the appeals/ complaints received the objective of transparency

law i s defeated.

2. Very Few Female Appellants/Complainants:

Of the disposed orders analysed for the study i t i s found that only 7% of the

appellants/complainants are female and the remaining 93% are from male candidates. From

these numbers i t’s evident this transparency l egislation i s not being used by the female

population at all. While the reasons for the same are not clear, i t helps to conduct awareness

activities and campaigns to encourage women to use the Right to I nformation Act.

3. Reasons for Appeals/ Complaints:

It i s found that 80% of the appeals/ complaints filed before at the i nformation commission are due

to the fact that the concerned PIO did not respond to the application at all. 15% of the appeal/

complaints are filed as the PIO furnished partial i nformation. The remaining 5% i nclude cases of

misleading/ i ncorrect i nformation from PIO, erroneous transfer of the application under Section 6

(3) or the PIO refused to furnish the i nformation sought.

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4 Total 13,972 10,010 3,962 ₹ 2,23,000 ₹ 41,500

Under Section 7(8) of RTI Act, i n case of rejecting the application, the Public I nformation officer

shall communicate the following to the applicant

(i) the reasons for such rejection;

(ii) the period within which an appeal against such rejection may be preferred; and

(iii) the particulars of the appellate authority.

I n case of non response by PIO i n the stipulated time, the application i s deemed to be rejected.

But i t i s evident that this section i s being violated by the majority of the PIOs.

4. Information Sought - Voluntary Disclosure of Information:

Information sought i n 65% of the applications comes under Proactive Disclosure of i nformation

i.e., Section 4(2) of the RTI Act. I t mandates every public authority to provide as much i nformation

suo moto to the public at regular i ntervals through various means of communications, i ncluding

the I nternet, so that the public need not resort to the use of RTI Act.

If the i nformation was voluntarily disclosed to the public, the need to apply for i nformation under

RTI would not have been there. Thereby saving resources for all the parties i nvolved.

5. Non speaking orders - a concern:

In the orders of 68% of the disposed cases, the SIC did not quote relevant sections and 37% of

the orders did not have the details of i nformation sought by the appellant. I t deprives all the

involved parties of the fundamental right to know the basis of j udgement, which plays a crucial

role when a j udgement goes to l egal scrutiny at various l evels.

In several cases where i nformation was denied by the commission, i t was found that the orders

were not adequately reasoned and could be termed to be non-speaking orders. Several such

orders merely summarise the contention of the i nformation seeker and the denial by the PIO and

conclude by stating that i ntervention of the Commission was not required, without providing valid

reasons under the act.

The Supreme Court, i n numerous orders, has cautioned against the tendency of adjudicators to

give cryptic, unreasoned orders. I n 2012, the SC i n Manohar s/o Manikrao Anchule vs. State of

Maharashtra ( Civil Appeal No. 9095 of 2012), categorically, and i n great detail, l aid down that

judicial, quasi-judicial, and even administrative orders must contain detailed reasoning for their

decisions.

The phenomenon of I Cs not passing speaking orders i s problematic for several reasons,

including the public at l arge, having no way of finding out the rationale for the decisions of I Cs. I t

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is a violation of peoples’ right to i nformation and goes against the fundamental principles of

transparency. Such non-speaking orders stand very l ittle chance for l egal & effective public

scrutiny. I t also compromises the accountability of the i nstitution of i nformation commissions and

the performance of i nformation commissioners. Finally, deficient orders have l ittle value i n terms

of furthering the cause of transparency outside the scope of the l imited order.

6. Penalty Imposition:

In 42% of the analysed orders, the commissions observed that the PIO has violated the act. The

information commission should have i mposed a penalty as per the Section 20 of the RTI Act on

all these cases or at l east i nitiate the process of penalty i mposition. However, notices were i ssued

in 28% of the cases only and the penalty was not i mposed i n 97% of the cases, where the

commission has observed violations.

The RTI Act empowers the I nformation Commissioners to i mpose penalties of upto Rs. 25,000 on

PIOs for violating the provisions of the RTI Act. Section 20 of the RTI Act defines the violations of

the l aw for which PIOs must be penalised.

The penalty acts as a deterrent for those who fail to act as the act requires. I t sends the message

that the violators can get away without any penalty as no penalty was i mposed i n the majority of

the cases. By not i mposing a penalty, i n the i mposable cases the i nformation commission i s not

fulfilling i ts responsibility, this sends the wrong message to the public.

7. More than one hearing:

More than one hearing happened at the SIC i n 2% of the disposed appeals/ complaints. This not

only delays the process of j ustice delivery to the appellant but also consumes a significant

amount of time and money for all the parties i nvolved i n the hearing process. I t i s i mportant to

note that i t i s the appellant that suffers the most with the amount of travel i nvolved to appear i n

front the SIC and the associated costs with the same along with Justice delayed i s j ustice denied.

It i s i mportant to note that there i s no i nformation available on the status of such cases where the

commission has i ssued i nterim orders earlier. We don’t know how many more hearings have

happened on such cases or i f any hearings have happened at all.

8. Voluntary disclosure of i nformation - State Information

Commission’s Website:

It i s promising that the SIC has been regularly publishing the monthly status reports, which

includes the number of appeals/ complaints received, disposed of and pending by the end of the

given month. Although the order copies for the disposed cases by all the commissioners, notices

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issued by all of them are not available. Only the notices i ssued by the chief i nformation

commissioner are available on the website.

However, the i nformation on the number of non-compliance petitions and the filing process i s not

available on the i nformation commission’s website. We got to know that the commission started

recognizing non-compliance petitions as a separate category and they are numbered specially

which i s commendable.

9. Very few details of the commissioners appointment:

On the i nformation commission’s website, very few details pertaining to the appointment of the

commissioners are available and this i s against the spirit of the i nstitution, whose objective i s to

foresee the i mplementation of the transparency l egislation. I n the unbifurcated state of Andhra

Pradesh, appointment details of the commissioners used to be available but the current website

doesn’t have these details.

Currently the i nformation commission’s website has CVs of few commissioners with the CV of

chief i nformation commissioner notably missing. The website should have all the documents

including the minutes of the high power committee designated for the appointment of the

commissioners, CVs of the commissioners and details of all the candidates applied for the post of

CVs.

10.No annual reports:

After the bifurcation of the state Andhra Pradesh I nformation Commission and the formation of

State I nformation Commission, SIC didn’t release a single annual report yet.

Under Section 25(1) of the RTI Act, 2005 the State I nformation Commission at the end of each

year shall prepare a report on the i mplementation of the provisions of this Act. I t consists of the

consolidated statement on the applications received and disposed of by various departments

(including the SIC ) under the RTI Act. The report prepared shall be forwarded to the Government

which i n turn will place i t before the Andhra Pradesh State Legislative Assembly.

Conclusion:

It i s really disheartening to see the below par performance of the i nformation commissioners i n

an i nstitution that i s responsible for upholding transparency. By not publishing the annual reports,

the i nformation commission i s abdicating i ts moral and l egal responsibility and accountability

towards people, l egislature.

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SIC should set an example to all public i nformation officers i n the state by being quick i n

disposing the appeals/complaints, follow supreme court guidelines for quasi j udicial orders i n

their orders and being transparent i n disclosure of details about the commissioners etc..

However, we see things changing for the better, post appointment of the chief i nformation

commission and the publication of monthly reports with the number of appeals/complaints

received, cleared, pending etc. i s a testimony to this. We hope RTI activists, Civil Society Groups,

and the Government use this report to i nitiate discussions on the functioning of SIC and RTI

implementation at l arge i n the state.

About Us:

United Forum for RTI Campaign - Andhra Pradesh

United Forum for RTI Campaign AP i s a confederation of around 70 civil society organizations.

The forum was started i n 2007. Since then the Forum i s actively i nvolved i n advocacy i ssues,

conducting workshops, training volunteers, organizing RTI awareness campaigns etc.

To l earn more about our work read our blog at h ttp://ufrti.blogspot.com/

LibTech India

LibTech I ndia i s a team of engineers, social workers and social scientists who are i nterested i n

improving public service delivery i n I ndia. They are i nspired by I ndia’s Right to I nformation

movement and believe that transparency can go a l ong way i n reducing corruption and i mproving

accountability. They work with several state governments and CSOs to i mprove transparency and

accountability i n public service delivery through action research.

To l earn more about their work visit their website at h ttps://libtech.in

We would l ike to thank Satark Nagrik Sangathan for their reports on I nformation Commissions,

which i nspired us to take up this study.

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