JOIN USOnly a fifth of secretariat offices accept RTI queries online
Almost a year since the government launched the Right to Information (RTI) online portal, only six of the 39 secretariat offices have extended the online facility to the public. Apart from secretariat offices, local bodies such as Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) and major state-run corporations are yet to accept online RTI queries.
Officials say the RTI online application was recently handed over to the Centre for e-Governance, and onboarding of all other departments to the platform was under progress.
The government had launched the online facility during February 2020, based on the directions of the Supreme Court. The portal was hit by technical glitches related to payment gateways in its initial days. They were subsequently addressed by the authorities.
A review of the state RTI website - rtionline.karnataka.gov.in - by DH showed that the number of departments outside the online facility outnumbered those accepting online applications by a factor of four to one.
Of the 39 secretariat offices of the government, only eight had online facility while key offices such as Chief Minister’s Office, Chief Secretary’s Office and the Health and Family Welfare Department were yet to adapt to the facility for the benefit of the public.
None of the urban civic bodies such as BBMP, urban development authorities, enterprises run by the government under various departments and the housing and transport corporations is yet to feature in the online RTI facility of the government.
Responding to queries by DH, Shalini Rajneesh, Additional Chief Secretary, Planning Department forwarded a response from Vipin Singh, CEO, Centre for e-Governance.
In the reply, Singh said the application was currently hosted by NIC Data Centre, Bengaluru.
Onboarding underway
“It is planned to migrate the application to State Data Centre and integrate with Khajane-2 for online payment of RTI fee, and onboard other departments,” he said, noting that preparatory work for the same was under progress.
“We shall start onboarding of other departments very shortly,” he added.