OMR/ANSWER SHEETS SHOULD BE PROVIDED TO EXAMINEE/STUDENT ON REQUEST UNDER RTI ACT

ANOTHER SUCCESS STORY OF LOKSATTA.... 

On request, any OMR/Answer Sheet has to be provided to the student/examinee, under RTI ACT.  Mr. Srinivas Rao of Lok Satta Party helped one such examinee to get access to his answer sheets and also the key.

Read on for more... 

 

Mr.Y.Naresh, had appeared for the SI exam conducted by the State Level Police Recruitment Board (SLPRB) in the year 2008. The results were declared in the year 2009. On 14th March 2009, he filed an RTI application with the Public Information Officer (PIO), requesting him to provide Xerox copies of his OMR Sheets for Paper III, Paper IV and also the answer keys to his Paper III and Paper IV question paper booklets.

 

The PIO in his reply stated that he cannot divulge the OMR sheets as they are confidential. Mr. Naresh made a first appeal with the Appellate Authority on the 6th of April 2009. He too gave the same reply.

On 19th May 2009, he filed a second appeal with the AP Information Commission. The second appeal came for hearing in the AP Information Commission vide Case No.4434/ CIC/2009. The hearing was held in the presence of State Chief Information Commissioner Mr. C.D. Arha’s Chambers on 23rd April 2010.

The State Level Police Recruitment Board (SLPRB) was represented by Mr. Satyanarayana, IPS, Inspector General & PIO of the SLPRB. While, Mr. Naresh was represented by Mr. Ganji Sreenivasa Rao of Lok Satta Party, Incharge, CHC, Saroornagar and Mr. Sunand P.

The arguments were short and to the point:

Mr. Satyanarayana tried to reason that if OMR sheets are provided lots of candidates would be applying for them and they would have difficulty in daily administration. Mr. Arha opined that given the fact that he himself has recently directed the NTR Health University to provide answer sheets to an applicant (Dr. L. Srinivas vide Appeal No. 4192 /CIC/2009, Dt. 02- 02-2010) and the fact that the Central Information Commissioner, Mr. Wajahat Habibullah (vide cic.gov.in/CIC-Orders/WB-04032009-04.pdf page no.5 para 41) issued directions stating that OMR sheets and evaluated answer sheets should be provided to the applicants under the RTI Act, the stand of the SLPRB that OMR Sheets are confidential isn’t correct!

He also quoted that, “The Hon’ble High Court of Delhi while dealing with an appeal in a similar matter, challenging the order of the Central Information Commission directing to provide a certified copy of the answer sheet to a student, held that the answer sheet cannot be excluded from the purview of Right to Information Act and the examination authority cannot deny the same to students under the Act and directed the Institute of Charted Accountants of India to provide a certified copy of the paper to students under the RTI Act. The Hon’ble High Court of Delhi further observed that the RTI Act legitimately confers positive power to citizens and there should be no further delay in such matters.”

He directed the PIO, SLPRB to provide Mr. Naresh access to the photocopies of the OMR sheets and also the answer keys to his question paper booklets.

This judgment will bring in total transparency, accountability and ensure that the evaluation system runs absolutely fairly. This judgment along with the judgment of the Central Information Commissioner holds good for every examination conducted by any University and by any Public Authority. It would instill confidence in lakhs of people about the fairness of the examinations and their evaluation. And in case some mistake occurs, it provides a window of opportunity for their genuine grievance to be addressed.

Here’s a toast to Transparency and Accountability!

REGARDS,

LOKSATTA PARTY.

RTI helps to inspect recordsat government offices

"Growth means change and change involves risk, stepping from the known to the unknown.”
And yes, we wanted to explore that unknown to bring a change. A change that will ensure the growth of the society.

Have you ever felt the nerve to inspect the Govt records and bring to light the corrupted activities? We did and that very thought made us well prepared for yet another attack on corruption, with our very own weapon RTI.

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EVENT : Inspection of Records in Government Offices.

DATE(S): 20th March 2010 and 13th April 2010

GOVT. OFFICE(S) VISITED:

1. Irrigation & Command Area Develipment Department, AP Secretariat(on 13/04/2010)
2. Sri Parvathi Jadala Ramalingeswara Swami Devasthanam, Cheruvugattu Village, Narkatpalli Mandalam, Nalgonda Dt. (on 20/03/2010)

PURPOSE:

1. To verify whether the purchases/transactions are made from valid TOT or VAT dealers who inturn pays taxes to government.(Total amount of tax evasion every year is between 10,000 - 20,000 crores).
2. To verify whether the authorities are maintaining proper records for every rupee they receive/ every rupee they spend.
3. To ensure that the respective organizations are not escaping from paying the right amount of taxes that they should be paying ( By verifying the bills)

This will help us to understand and control the corruption level in that particular organization.

DETAILS OF SECTIONS USED:

1. RTI Act 2005, section 2(j)(I) gives the power to every individual to inspect any record of the govt. organization.
2. RTI Act 2005, section 2(j)(II) says that every one has the right to take the duplicate copy of the desired receipts.
3. As per VAT Act 2005, sec 17, every shop owner(turn over > 5lakhs) has to be registered as TOT or VAT dealer and must pay tax quarterly.
4. TOT(Turn over Tax) or TIN(Tax identification number) number must be printed on every bill.

For more information on commercial tax department, please refer following site, https://apcommercialtaxes.gov.in/

PROCEDURE:  For anybody who would like to verify the records,

1. File a RTI to the respective department/Organization where we wish to conduct an inspection. Please find attached RTI application's we filed to above offices.
2. We will be allocated a specific timeslot for the same, which is feasible for the respective Department/Organization, to proceed with review of records. Please find attached the response from respective departments.

ACTIVITIES DONE:

1. Verified: Inspection of bills(Money spent) for financial year 2005-06 and 2006-07 in temple.
2. Verified: Inspection of bills(Money spent) between 29/12/2009 and 31/12/2009 for stationary and other purposes.
3. Verified whether bills are from valid TOT or VAT dealer as per VAT Act 2005 (None of the bills had TOT or VAT number on it .i.e.NO TAX was paid for these purchases/transactions which was in lakhs)

We are going file a complaint with Commercial tax department on this.

ADVANTAGES:

• We can catch hold of illegal business owners who are evading lakhs of commercial taxes every year.
• We get to see how exactly the Govt. money is being spent at various organizations.
• If we feel that a particular organization is corrupted in any way, we can file complaint and make sure that the necessary actions are taken to bring the corruption levels to zero.
• Organizations will now be more disciplined and with surprise visits by the responsible people will make every Govt. employee work diligently.

In a simple words "More disciplined, Transparent and Corruption free Society"

OUR TEAM:

1. Srinivas Rao Ganji
2. Abdul Azeez Shaik
3. Subrahmanyam
4. Praveen
5. Kiran

PHOTOS: Please find below the link for photos of the event,

http://picasaweb.google.com/LoksattaSanjeevani/InspectionOfRecordsInGovtOfficesUsingRTI

Please join us in these activities and let us all work for the betterment of society that we all dream of, every minute and every day.

Regards
LOK SATTA PARTY-(Citizen Help Center, Saroornagar

Surveys for prohibition of illegal packaged drinking water manufacturers

As we all know, Water is essential for all dimensions of life. Over the past few decades, use of water has increased, and in many places water availability is falling to crisis levels. High quality water is now more than the dream of the conservationists, more than a political slogan; high quality water, in the right quantity at the right place at the right time, is essential to health, recreation, and economic growth.

Taking this importance given to water in daily life, and to good health, we , the Loksatta CHC(Citizen Help Centre) decided to inspect the quality of water supplied in packets, bottles at various places in and around Hyderabad. AfterAfter all our inspections and investigations, we found that there are 2 to 10 (approx) water plants manufacturing the packaged drinking water illicitly and improperly using ISI standard mark illegally. Complete details for your reference and awareness, below.

Event : Survey on illegitimate manufacturing of ISI packaged drinking water, (sachets, bottles, cans etc) in Hyderabad, RangaReddy and Medak Districts, breaching the Bureau of Indian Standards Act 1986

Date : During the month of March ( It has been carried all through the month, at various places)

Office(s) Visited : Survey on nearly 60 places, water packets gathered from various public places.

Purpose :

1. To reduce illegitimate manufacturing of packaged drinking water
2. To control illegal usage of ISI mark, and there by ensuring good health to people.

 Govt. Orders Used and Details : As per the BIS(Bureau of Indian Standards) Act, every packaged drinking water manufacturer has to obtain permission from BIS.

 Procedure : 

1.  Visit http://nicdc.nic.in/CMMS/InternetRep/HORepListOfLicences.aspx?Report=14 to get the list of packaged drinking water manufactures who obtained licence. Type IS no: 14543 and get the report (or) If you dont find adequate information, please file a RTI to BIS Hyderabad (Visit http://www.bis.org.in/ for more details on BIS Act and Rules)
2.  Buy a water packets or bottles at your nearby places like Cool drink shops, Pan Shops, APSRTC bus stations so on.......
3. Check if there is valid ISI mark on the water packets (Check the following link for more information on this http://bis.org.in/other/enf.pdf.
4. Check the name and address of the manufacturer have granted permission from BIS(You already got list of genuine manufactures from step 1)
5. File a complaint online at http://www.bis.org.in/cad/complain.htm or send a mail to addresses in below mail
6. File a RTI to track the status of the complaint.

 Activities Done:

• Getting a list of water plants which have been granted license and permission by BIS organization, in Hyderabad Dist and Rangareddy Dist. The results are : BIS granted permission for 60 Water plants in Rangareddy Dist and 18 in Hyderabad.
• We found that there are 2 to 10 (approx) water plants manufacturing the packaged drinking water illicitly and using ISI standard mark illegally.
• We later found that these illegally packaged water is circulated to the nearby APSRTC Bus Stations, Pan shops, Cool Drink Shops, Water Kiosks, Wine shops, Theatres etc. creating havoc to the health of the general public. Even educated people are getting cheated here with illegal use of standard ISI mark.
• Gathering those water plants, we have sent a mail to Bureau of Indian Standards, with the list of Manufacturer’s details we gathered in our survey, and also the CM/L details.
• The request is to take legal proceedings, as per the Bureau of Indian Standards Act 1986 under section 33, at the earliest on all the illegitimate manufacturers of packaged drinking water in all the districts in Andhra Pradesh and safe guard the health of lakhs of people who are consuming them unknowingly.
• We got immediate response from BIS authorities that required action would be taken.

Advantages: 

•  Illegal activities will be controlled.
• Any level of corruption is identified and taken care of.
• Good health to people.

In other words, "More desciplined, corruption free, legally strong and healthy nation"

 Most of us have never really learned how important water is to us. We understand it, but we do not respect it.

It is high time we spread the awareness to every body in the society so that they can "ACT" when they see similar cases in their localities. In a billion+ people country like ours, the winning against the anti social elements, can only be achieved through UNITY.

 Join us and participate in this WAR. Let us work hard to see that "GLORIOUS INDIA" "DEVELOPED INDIA" before we die!!

 Jai Hind!

Survey at Government Offices to check impelmentation of RTI Act

RTI is the one of the strongest weapons that the citizen in this country can ever get. It is the easiest way to control and avoid corruption in the society and gives us a hope to dream for an honest country.

As someone rightly said, "Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending that we aim for".

With this in mind, we, the Loksatta CHC(Citizen Help Centre) started a lot of activities with RTI as a key tool, which will benefit the society in multiple ways.As part of this, on 6th March 2010,We did a survey at various government offices . Complete details below :

Event               : To check Implementation of RTI Act in Government Offices in Saroor Nagar Area

Date                : 6th March 2010

Offices Visited :

                         1. Tahsildar office

                         2. MPDO ( Mandal Parishad Development Office)

                         3. GHMC - LB Nagar Circle

Purpose          : The survey was primarily to check the implementation of the RTI Acts under sections 4(1)b and 5(1), (2), and 19(1).

RTI Acts involved and the details : 4(1)b and 5(1), (2), and 19(1)

Information that needs to be displayed : Below information needs to be displayed as per the above acts,The handbook (which will contain the details about the office, the officers within, the employees' duties and responsibilities, their names, salaries and other primary information) and board at the office entrance(which will contain the details about the Public Information Officer, Assistant Public Information Officer and Appellate Authority's name, the office address, Phone numbers, Mobile numbers, Fax numbers, Email address)

Procedure :

1) Do a survey to find out the offices which are not following RTI act

2) File a complaint to respective office and file a RTI to track the status

Activities Done :

1) Verified whether each government office has its RTI board and handbook as per sec 4(1)(b)

2) Registered a complaint for offices not following above rules and filed a RTI to track the status of the complaint

Advantages : Transparency and Accountability(This will help people contact the right person with out any confusion and they will immediately understand whom to approach, in case of issues).

Observations:

Only MPDO is having display board ( with nothing written on it ) and the remaining two have nothing to display at all.

We have filed complaint regarding the same for remaining two offices and again filed an RTI to track the status of the complaint.

Results so far:  Tahsildar office got its RTI board at entrance and we are following up for other complaints and we are expecting positive response from respecting authorities.

We are planning to file a WRIT on this in AP High court so that offices all over AP start implementing it.

Team Participated: Srinivas Ganji, Abdul Azeez, Pradeep, Savan Bandu and Praveen.

For photos of the event, visit following link,
http://picasaweb.google.com/LoksattaSanjeevani/06Mar2010SurveryAtGovernmentOffices#

All these attachments are uploaded at "files" section of loksattaSanjeevani@googlegroups.com group.

Join us in these activities. Let us fight for our rights. Let us fight for a better society and a better nation.