Seeking information under RTI Act expensive in HP

[ganpat1956]

SHIMLA: Seeking information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act in Himachal Pradesh is about five times more expensive than the fee charged at the Union government level.

After paying an application fee of Rs 10, a person seeking information under RTI has to pay Rs 10 per page for photocopy of an a-4 size sheet and Rs 20 if the size of the paper is more than this, sources in the Information Commission here said.

The charge per page of photocopy of a-4 size sheet at the Union government level is only Rs two, they said.

Besides, information available in the form of printed publication will be made available at printed price, they added.

For information available in electronic form and supplied in the same form, CD or floppy disk, the charge is Rs 50 per floppy and Rs 100 per CD, the sources said.

The fee for perusal of government files is Rs 10 for 15 minutes and the amount will multiply for every additional 15 minutes, they said.

Chief Information Commissioner of the state Prem Singh Rana maintains that the fee is not a hindrance to people seeking information under the act.

"The amount (Rs 10 per page) is not for generating revenue but is aimed at spreading awareness about the act from the money acquired from the applicants," Rana said, adding that so far, nobody has objected to the fee amount.

Seeking information under RTI Act expensive in HP-India-The Times of India

[karira]

Is there any member on the forum who can file a RTI application with the HPSIC and ask for the following information:

"How much money has been collected by way of application fees, charges, etc, and how much has been spent for 'spreading awareness' about RTI, since the introduction of RTI 2005."

All the Rs 10.00 we pay for our applications go into some account which the SIC will not even be aware of. I have once been made to give a D/D for Rs. 10.00 in the name of "APIO, Baheerbagh". No idea what happened to the D/D, although I got the information.

(Basheerbagh in Hyderabad is like Chandni Chowk or T Nagar or Jodhpur Park or Chembur in other metros).