BHUBANESWAR: A national conference of all state chief information commissioners (SCICs) was held in Hyderabad on Thursday.
The conference was inaugurated by Telangana Governor Shiv Pratap Shukla during which the participants discussed various best practices being followed in different states to reduce the pendency of cases.
Odisha chief information commissioner Manoj Parida explained how pendency of cases have been reduced in the state through summary trials and without unnecessary adjournments. Discussions also focused on preventing misuse of the RTI Act by vested interests, while promoting its utilisation by ordinary citizens.
The Maharashtra chief information commissioner briefed the gathering on how their state government amended its RTI rules to restrict questions to one subject and 150 words only.
During the conference, the central information commissioners emphasised on regular training of ground-level officials dealing with RTI Act. They requested the state governments to ensure suo motu disclosure of information on official websites of various departments, besides providing adequate staff to the state commissions.
