Srinagar, September 04(Scoop News)- While hitting out at the hypocrisy of National Conference reflecting once again in chief minister, Omar Abdullah’s support for bringing political parties under the ambit of Right to Information Act (RTI), Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Wednesday said that such utterances are meaningless unless people know the details of the wealth amassed by the top leadership of National Conference.
In a statement, the party’s Chief Spokesperson, Naeem Akhtar said that nobody knows the factual position about the money being given to NC top leadership in lieu of MLC seats and Haji Yousuf ‘s death removed the lid from to all such corrupt practices only partially. He said that if NC is really sincere about transparency and accountability why doesn’t the party declares itself as a “ Public Authority “ , so that people can seek information from them about Haji Yousuf mysterious death and the money that changed hands amongst the top party leadership? People want to know about the illegal financial dealings taking place within the ruling party. Will the party provide all such information under RTI Act to the people of State? Has the amount collected from various characters involved in the episode been returned to them? Akhtar said the party needs to come clean on all these issues and the source of wealth of the top party leadership.
Akhtar said it was the NC- led government, which weakened J&K RTI Act-2009, by amending its rules last year in September. “The government has rendered State Information Commission (SIC) toothless by clipping the powers of Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) and also degrading the rank and status of the Secretary State Information Commission, who under the previous RTI rules could only be appointed, if he was in the grade of a Special Secretary to J&K government,” he said adding now even Additional Secretary is eligible for the post of Secretary SIC. The SIC had powers to summon and issuing warrants to any erring officer but that rule has also been changed by the NC regime. Even the rules for the physical appearance of top level government functionaries before SIC were amended and now it has no such powers.
Akhtar said the government has also bypassed the role of Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) in appointing Secretary State Information Commission, diluting his authority. He said chief minister during his speech spoke about the importance of section 4 of RTI Act but even his own office has not adhered to it. The official website of J&K Government is defunct since 3 years. Can Omar Abdullah tell people what kind of voluntary disclosure the CM’s office has made under section 4 of RTI Act? Akhtar Questioned.
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