Replace culture of secrecy with transparency: Vohra

Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 6

Governor NN Vohra today stressed replacing the culture of secrecy with openness, transparency and optimum participation of people.

Addressing a regional conference on the Right to Information (RTI) Act after inaugurating it here this morning, he expressed gratification that despite initial difficulties, the RTI Act had taken deep roots across the country.

He observed that a good deal of work was still required to be done for ensuring that this statute was put to meaningful use to promote transparency and accountability and visibly reduce corruption in the system.

In this context, he underlined the importance of ensuring that all stakeholders were made aware of their rights and encouraged to make judicious use of the RTI Act to promote larger public interest.

The Governor said he had “the opportunity of closely observing the evolution of acceptance of this law in J&K and complimented Chief Information Commissioner of J&K GR Sufi for stabilising functioning of the State Information Commission despite difficulties faced in the initial period”.

He further said “for effective functioning of the RTI Act, considerable improvement shall need to be brought about in the maintenance of record in public offices and replace the traditional secrecy with openness and transparency except in matters which need to remain undisclosed in national interest”.

He observed that “we may see considerable reduction in the number of RTI applications which are being received by the public authorities if Section 4 of RTI Act is implemented and the public authorities suo motu disclose information by putting up the same on their websites”.

The Governor observed that the RTI Act had been strengthened through various Supreme Court rulings lending it a constitutional status and this had further strengthened and made possible the success of steps taken for ensuring transparency and accountability in the working of public authorities and promoting and propagating the culture of accessing information held by them as a matter of right of the common citizen.

Vohra said “today’s regional conference is another step towards creating awareness amongst all stakeholders, government functionaries and the public at large”. He wished the participants success in their deliberations and hoped that many sound suggestions would emerge from the deliberations.

The Chief Information Commissioner, in his welcome address, spoke about the functioning of the SIC in J&K. Prof Sunita Zalpuri, faculty of social sciences, IMPA&RD, Jammu, briefed the participants about the agenda of the conference. Dr Jahan Ara Jabeen, associate professor, IMPA&RD, Srinagar, presented the vote of thanks on the occasion.

The conference was being organised by the Institute of Management and Public Administration and Rural Development (IMPA&RD), J&K, in collaboration with the State Information Commission (SIC), J&K.

GR Sufi, Chief Information Commissioner, J&K; Bhim Sen, CIC, Himachal Pradesh; Wajahat Haibullah, former CIC, India; Nazir Ahmed, State Information Commissioner, J&K; BR Sharma, Chief Secretary; and Dr Arun Kumar, DG, IMPA&RD, Kashmir, were present on the occasion.