In violation of Supreme Court directions, 28 persons are being kept in solitary confinement in various jails all over the country. Information under Right to Information (RTI) Act obtained by Navkiran Singh, a lawyer practising in Punjab and Haryana High Court, reveals that West Bengal has the maximum number of prisoners kept ‘illegally’ in solitary confinement. While West Bengal has 16 such prisoners, Rajasthan and Jharkhand have three each. As per...

A group of activists has raised concerns over the government’s proposed amendments to the Right to Information (RTI) Act, saying they could limit the scope of the landmark legislation. The activists claimed that some of the proposed changes were tailor made for officials to reject RTI queries, which could pave the way for pressure tactics against RTI applicants. “The government is trying to insert a provision that would allow an applicant...

The number of Right to Information (RTI) applications received by the Pune Municipal Corporation has increased from 6,793 in 2009 to 10,552 in 2010, in spite of the civic body providing information to citizens every Monday from 3 to 5 pm. While civic officials cited the increased awareness about the RTI Act among citizens as reason for the rising number of applications, activists said that the Monday scheme has not been...

State information commissioner H N Krishna on Saturday fined an official from Mandya for delaying information sought under the Right to Information Act. Hearing the petitions filed before the information court, the commissioner took the taluk panchayat official of K R Pet taluk to task and fined him Rs 5,000. The application was pending before him for nine months. "Officials must provide details within 30 days of filing of the application. In...

The Department of Personnel and Training has rejected most of the changes suggested in the government's Draft Rules for the Right to Information Act by the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC). The NAC, therefore, decided on Friday to have a face-to-face consultation with the DoPT before finalising its recommendations on the subject. The NAC had specifically objected to two proposed changes– abating of the proceedings before the Information Commission if...