2000 central government organisations to accept online RTI applications

New Delhi: Around 2,000 Central government organisations will soon be accepting applications under the Right to Information (RTI) Act through online medium.

The move is based on the suggestion given by a group of secretaries before Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has started a massive exercise to train nodal officers of all such public authorities who have not yet started accepting the RTI pleas online.

In a stern directive, it has asked all the government departments to attend a workshop being organised by the DoPT in this regard without fail. In case, the officers concerned fail to attend the workshop, a username will be created suo-motu and all these public authorities will be made live on the RTI portal.

As many as 690 public authorities have been aligned so far on the especially designed website www.rtionline.gov.in to enable online filing of the RTI applications.

The DoPT had during June and July this year conducted a workshop for 330 public authorities. Of these, 51 nodal officers did not attend the workshop.

Since all the public authorities (around 2,000) will have to be aligned in a time bound manner ( a target/timeline fixed and monitored at the highest level), DoPT is organising yet another training workshop as a special drive for those defaulted public authorities and nodal officers who did not attend the workshop

It requested that all nodal officers under 51 public authorities attend the workshop without fail on Tuesday, the DoPT said in the order.

It may be noted by all concerned that no further opportunity would be given to the nodal officers after this workshop, the order said.

In case the concerned nodal officer is unable to attend this training, the username will be created suo motu and the concerned public authority will be made live on the RTI online portal with effect from September 30, by DoPT, it said.

The RTI Act, 2005, enables a citizen to seek tome-bound reply on governance related matters. People can also make payment of RTI fee online.

On the occasion of completion of more than 10 years of implementation of the RTI Act, the Central Information Commission is going to hold annual convention in October, the DoPT said.

PTI