In terms of of disposal rate ofRTIpleas,Telanganaranks 10th among states with 8,902 pleas pending with thestate information commission(SIC) as of June 2022, according to the Report Card of Information Commissions in India (RCICI) published by SatarkNagrik Sangathan(SNS) in December last year. Since August 2022, the SIC has been functioning without a chief commissioner.
Between July 2021 to June 2022, a total of 7,169 complaints and appeals were registered in Telangana and 9,267 were settled, including those pending from the previous years. The average annual disposal rate per commissioner stands at 1,545, placing the state at 11th rank.
The state also lags when it comes to issuing showcase notices and imposing penalties on departments. The state recorded 52 cases where a penalty of 2 lakh was imposed, but gave compensation of 6,000 in only one case to the RTI applicant. The RCICI report also said that the SIC failed to publish even a single annual report since it was established in 2017.
Around 86% of the RTIs filed in the state are by social workers and journalists. But RTI activists said that over the years certain departments have stopped bothering to reply to queries.