No Lok Adalat for Karnataka despite the state receiving 1000 RTI second appeals every month

RTI was enacted by the Indian parliament in 2005

Till date, 28,000 cases of RTI second appeals remain unanswered by the Karnataka Information Commission, reports Times of India.

The report also states that the Supreme Court directed the state information commissions to dispose of the rising number of pending RTIs via Lok Adalats in 2014.

Unlike states like Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, UP and Goa that held Lok Adalats as per the ruling, the Karnataka Information Commission chose to ignore the directive.

Second appeals are filed by RTI applicants to state or central information commissions, if they are dissatisfied with or do not get a reply from the information officers and appellate authorities of government bodies within a month from the date of filing a query.

A reason for this alarming backlog as stated by L Krishnamurthy, State Information Commissioner, Karnataka is the shortage of manpower. At present, there are four information commissioners appointed by the state government including Krishnamurthy, who is due to retire in January 2016.

RTI was enacted by the Indian parliament in 2005 in order to make government (central or state) departments accountable to ordinary citizens.

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