Assam Info Commission pulls up PWD over Rs 36.19 cr VIP road work RTI data

Guwahati, April 8: Displeased at the failure of the PWD to provide information sought through RTI, the Assam Information Commission has held that implementation of the 2005 Act is not only a legal requirement but is also compulsory as per a recent direction of the Supreme Court.

The observation came on a second appeal filed by advocate Nayan Moni Hazarika who was not provided with the complete information on the works carried out on on Guwahati's VIP Road since 2011. Hazarika approached the commission after failing to get the required information even after moving the first appellate authority.

Hazarika had sought details and tender notices of all works carried out on VIP Road since 2011. According to the reply from PWD, the total amount sanctioned for repairing, beautification etc., of the VIP Road is Rs 3,619 lakh.

However, the "amount cannot be considered as exact amount, as the government has sanctioned few (more) schemes". The tender notices made available to Hazarika were only from 2018. The PWD also mentioned that "no schemes were sanctioned for drainage works".

Aggrieved at the response, Hazarika approached the Information Commission, insisting that the response of the PWD was not acceptable and "lack of transparency in declaring the details of the projects as asked is indicative of an effort to hide facts, revelation of which would expose the corrupt officers."

In an order, Chief Information Commissioner Bhaskar Jyoti Mahanta expressed surprise over the fact that it took two months to transfer the RTI application from the office of the Chief Engineer to the SPIO (State Public Information Officer) in the office of Executive Engineer, a distance of merely 5 km.

"More than the deficiency of receipt and dispatch mechanism, there is reason to suspect manipulative entry of dates in either of the two offices. Both the offices, which work in tandem, do not appear to have a proper coordination mechanism. It is clear from the written statement of the PIO that he came to know about the first appeal only from the petitioner," Ma-hanta observed.

Interestingly, the SPIO said in his second reply that search is still on to locate the documents asked for.

The Chief Information Commissioner further ordered that the PWD should ensure that the details of projects undertaken from 2011 are uploaded. He further directed that the information sought by the petitioner on the works carried out on VIP Road since 2011 should be made available to the petitioner within a period of 30 days.