Director DD is India’s RTI shame in J&K

Obama praises India for sunshine law, DD official spits on it in public

Early Times Report

SRINAGAR, Nov 9: President of the United States of America, Barack Obama, was all praise in his speech in the Parliament on Monday for Manmohan Singh’s India over the transparency in governance and implementation of Right to Information (RTI) Act in this country. However, treating Jammu & Kashmir as “a state of special status”, where the Indian systems should be brazenly discredited to erode common man’s faith, Director of Doordarshan Kendra (DDK) Srinagar, Dr Rafeeq Masoodi, has been treating the sunshine law with contempt from his day one in office. Even the Deputy Director General of Doordarshan, incharge North India and an appellate authority for RTI, has failed to discipline this recalcitrant official who has been sticking to his chair courtesy union Minister of Health, Ghulam Nabi Azad.

Under the RTI Act, being smoothly implemented by offices of the Government of India throughout the country, Director DDK Srinagar, Rafeeq Masoodi, and the national broadcaster’s PIO in Srinagar, Shabir Mujahid, were supposed to provide information to an applicant within 28 days. Jammu-based prominent lawyer and RTI activist, advocate Sheikh Shakil Ahmed, has however failed to get a positive response from DDK Srinagar for 235 days to the application he had filed on March 19^th this year.

In his application, dated 19-03-2010, Advocate Shakil had sought detailed information with regard to the programmes produced---and their respective payees---by by seven DDK Srinagar producers, namely Swadesh Bakhshi, Kousar Parveen, Syed Zeeshan Fazil, Rashid Javed, Haleema Parveen, Shammi Shayir and Mufti Riyaz. Caring two hoots for the punishment the lawmakers had provided for the defaulters, Masoodi and Mujahid did not bother to even respond to the applicant weeks after the deadline.

Shakil had filed the application after allegations were galore that Director, DDK Srinagar, had swindled funds worth Crores of Rupees in league with the seven particular producers. He planned to file a separate application about the programmes claimed to have been produced by another producer, namely Nasir Mansoor, who alongwith Shammi Shayir had allegedly embezzled 90 percent of the funds provided by union Ministry of Agriculture on account of producing “Krishi Darshan”---a programme for farmers---in the last five years. The applicant had demanded details regarding the in-house programmes claimed to have been produced by seven particular producers since the day Masoodi had joined as head of DD’s Srinagar station.

In his letter dated April 22, addressed to the applicant, PIO Shabir Mujahid sought extra time of “two more weeks” to do the needful. However, not an iota of the information requisitioned has been provided to Mr Shakil in the last 235 days.

“DDK Srinagar PIO initially sought extra time of two weeks. Later, after several weeks, he argued that the information to be collected was voluminous and could not be provided as long as there was disturbance in the Valley”, Shakil told Early Times. He said that when Masoodi and his subordinate officials failed to submit the data for several months, he sent a complaint to the Union Minister of Information & Broadcasting, CEO Prasar Bharti Broadcasting Corporation of India and Director General of Doordarshan.

DD’s Director (Tech) & Chief Public Information Officer informed the applicant in letter dated 1-10-2010 that his complaint dated 13-09-2010 had been treated as formal appeal. DDG Jailkhani was asked to ensure that the information sought under RTI Act was supplied to the applicant without further delay.

Subsequently, in his Order No:DDG(AJ)/Misc(5)RTI/2010 Dated October 11^th, 2010, DD’s DDG for North India and appellate authority, Ashok Jailkhani, directed Director DDK Srinagar, Rafeeq Masoodi, to provide full information to the applicant “within the period of one month”.

“It has been observed that the reply/information as sought by the applicant has been delayed considerably. Information regarding points Nos 1 and 2 of the application should not be very difficult for the Kendra to respond to. Information regarding point No: 3 may take some time as indicated by the Kendra. Kendra is advised to pass on the information urgently and make all-out efforts to supply the information within the period of one month”, Jailkhani wrote to Masoodi on October 11^th, while outrightly dismissing his argument of “disturbance” in the Valley.

Shakil said that even the appellate authority’s reprimand failed to chasten DDK Srinagar authorities. “Only to make further joke of the RTI, few days back DDK Srinagar official, Shammi Shayir, sent me a letter, predated over 15-07-2010 alongwith a completely irrelevant enclosure of 50 pages. Not a single word or sentence of the plethora of documents provided to me pertains to my RTI application”, Shakil revealed and asserted that he would be returning this uncalled for consignment to the appellate authority in original on expiry of the deadline on November 11^th, pressing hard for pronouncement of penalty for the defaulters.

Officials at DDK Srinagar endorsed that unprecedented indiscipline had ruined the station and most of the senior officials were neck-deep in corruption. According to them, it was talk of the town that Masoodi and Shayir had purchased huge houses in the posh Sidhra locality of Jammu through a lumberjack-turned-producer. “But, they would care little about Vigilance and CBI with regard to the assets disproportionate to their legal income as long as they continue to be under the protection of Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad”, said an eminent private producer and director.

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