HYDERABAD: The Right to Information campaign of the BJP is set to turn into a state-wide movement, as around 25,000 RTI queries are being dispatched to all 12,769 gram panchayat offices, and MPDO offices in all mandals across Telangana.
Former BJP State president N Indrasena Reddy himself donned the hat of an RTI activist, as he kept signing all the RTI queries which were addressed to the public information officers of the respective offices. The RTI applications will be first sent to BJP’s RTI Cell district conveners, who will then dispatch them to the party workers in the mandals and gram panchayats, who will then submit them at the respective government offices and take receipts.
The RTI queries to the gram panchayat offices include funds received through the Central Finance Commissions, State Finance Commissions, income of the GPs through various taxes, sand quarries, seigniorage fee, stamp duty and market CESS. Information is being sought on how all these funds have been spent since 2014 in the GP. Information on resolutions adopted by gram sabhas, attendance, minutes and data pertaining to drinking water connections before 2014 and after implementation of Mission Bhagiratha is also being sought.
At the mandal-level, there are four types of RTIs being filed in MPDO offices, including queries related to the funds spent from Central, State and Gram Panchayat funds to pay bills to contractors for various works since 2014, information about funds spent on crematoria, dhobi ghats, NREGS works, construction of roads under Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna, construction of toilets, funds spent on Aasara pensions with number of beneficiaries as per their categories and so on.
Specific to agriculture, information is being sought on Central and State funds spent on construction of Rythu Vedikas, and for implementation of schemes for the farmers’ welfare.The booth-level activists of BJP will have plenty of work to do, as they are the ones who are being entrusted with disseminating the information from the RTI replies to their villagers.
“There will be meetings held in every village, posters and banners will be displayed to inform the people who have been unaware about where all the funds were coming from. The party workers will go door-to-door explaining how the State government has been misappropriating the Central funds as their own,” Indrasena Reddy added.
The party leaders say that the RTIs being filed are just the beginning of a continuous exercise, where information related to many other subjects will be filed in the near future.“Though the immediate objective of the RTI campaign is to expose the State government’s false propaganda and its failures, its larger impact will be seen in the near future, as people will become more politically enlightened, will start questioning and seeking the truth,” stated Anthony Reddy, BJP’s legal cell convener.