Minam Saqib
Early Times Report
SRINAGAR, Feb 25: Tightening noose around bureaucrats for hiding information, government has directed departments to create own websites within two weeks or face action.
An order of the government issued on February 23, says that with a view to maintaining conformity with the provisions of Section 4 of J&K Right to Information Act, 2009, from time to time, instructions have been issued, impressing upon all the administrative secretaries, heads of the departments and public authorities of the state to ensure effective implementation of the provisions of Section 4 of the J&K RTI Act in letter and spirit by hosting all requisite information on the official websites and updating them periodically.
"However, it is being constantly observed that some of departments are not implementing the provisions of Section 4 of the Jammu & Kashmir Right to Information Act, 2009 and some of them have yet not created their departmental websites," the order reads.
The government as per the order has directed that all such departments having not so far created their own departmental websites are impressed upon to do so within a fortnight and host the requisite material on the websites.
"Further, all the Administrative Secretaries are enjoined upon to furnish the status on this account to the General Administration Department as well as State Information Commission within a week's time positively," it reads.
An official said that government has decided to take action against heads of department, who will not follow these directives.
The government has directed departments several times to update official websites on a regular basis. It was intended to provide updated information about the government's works to the people.
However, the websites of most of the departments are either not updated or defunct, or the old and irrelevant information has not been removed from there.
When one clicks website of some departments, some unknown website gets displayed, with content in an unknowingly language.
"This issue has been brought into the notice of authorities so many but to no avail. It seems that authorities were not concerned about updating the information on the website. Now government has decided that if departments do not act action will be taken against them strictly," the official said.
The official said that updating websites was one of the measures the government directed in the last around 22 months to make administration "responsive" and "transparency" in governance. |
