CIC aims to clear backlog of RTI cases in six months

NEW DELHI: Waiting for over three years for your Right to Information (RTI) case to be heard at Central Information Commission? The wait would finally end now.

For the first time in a decade, the Commission has set a deadline for itself to clear the backlog of cases older than three years over next three months. CIC, which is the final appellate authority for RTI, would prioritise all cases dating back to 2009. The Commission has identified 3,031 cases between 2009 and 2014 that have been pending before it. These would now be heard on priority by all commissioners between April and June. From July, the Commission would dedicate the next three months to clear the backlog of 2,462 cases of the year 2015.

The Commission would have to clear 5,493 cases over the next six months, which works an average of 100 cases per Commissioner in a month.


Speaking to ET, chief information commissioner R K Mathur said, “It is a target we have set for ourselves. The first three months would be used to clear the backlog of cases till 2014. After that we would clear the cases of 2015 over the following three months. For each of these cases we would fix a hearing and dispose them of. There remains no value for information which is delayed so much.”

The target is not very big as on an average every Commissioner disposes 150-200 cases in a month. However, this work would go simultaneously with regular Commission-work. Mathur is trying to spearhead the initiative by putting in extra hours for hearing cases. Over the last one-and a-half months, the chief has disposed of 700 RTI cases.

“We have to increase our man hours. There is no other way to address pendency,” he said. At present, the Commission has a pendency between 33,000-34,000. The Commission is already shorthanded as two Commissioners have retired over the last three months and no replacements have been identified by the government. Mathur said most of the cases pending for over three years have been largely because of oversight.