freedom1 Forum in collaboration with the Citizens’ Campaign for Right to Information and the World Bank Nepal Office organized a national seminar on Right to Information in the capital city, Kathmandu, on September 20, 2013. Three publications were released on the occasion.

World Bank’s Country Manager in Nepal, Tahseem Sayed and former Chief Information Commissioner Binay Kumar Kasajoo jointly released three books- two (Towards Open Government in Nepal, and RTI Success Stories from Nepal) published by the freedom1 Forum (Link: http://www.freedom1forum.org.np/content/publications/books.html) and one (RTI Use Tracking Survey) by the CCRI.

Addressing the programme, WB Country Director Sayed said the released three books were really useful to expand good governance and RTI regime in Nepal. She thanked the freedom1 Forum and CCRI for bringing such insightful publications that promote democratic culture.

“I expect the books would create a buzz in the sector of governance in Nepal,” she said, urging the government bodies to abide fully by the RTI and ease environment for better information and smooth service to people in particular and entire development process in general.

Moreover, she said the World Bank was committed to push the RTI agenda ahead as a critical tool for development.

Vikram Chand, a Lead Public Sector Specialist of World Bank in South Asia, also lauded the works of the freedom1 Forum in the RTI regime and good governance. He briefly spoke about RTI status in the South Asia. According to him, the status of RTI in Nepal and Bangladesh was similar, as in both countries, some particular CSOs have taken ahead the RTI issues. In the region, Pakistan has made a very good progress in RTI. He reminded that the political parties in India tried to keep them above the ambit of RTI but their efforts was aborted with public vigil. Anyway, big scandals were exposed with the use of RTI. Similarly, Bhutan was bringing RTI law in three to six months.

RTI expert and former registrar at the Supreme Court, Dr Ram Krishna Timalsina reminded that days twenty years back that it was very difficult to get material related to RTI in Nepal and in India too and expressed satisfaction that RTI has made progress these days. According to him, information was the fuel of democracy and any rich person these days was empowered with information.

“Not only for democracy but for the strengthening of the entire nation, RTI is essential,” he remarked.

Chairman of the Administrative Court, Kashiraj Dahal, said the publication of the three books was the proof that RTI was a vibrant tool to transform society. RTI is a significant tool to restore rule of law, he said, adding that Nepal had the most effective RTI law in South Asia for the consolidation of democracy.

On the occasion, Chairman of the freedom1 Forum Taranath Dahal, who presided over the programme, said the seminar was organized to discuss the achievements and experiences in the sector of RTI since its establishment six years’ back. The two publications by the FF on RTI were the documentation of how FF was working in RTI in these six years.

Executive Director at FF, Krishna Sapkota, made presentation on the publication ‘RTI Success Stories from Nepal’, while Treasurer Chiranjivi Kafle on the publication, ‘Towards Open Government in Nepal’ and CCRI Executive Chairman Tanka Aryal on ‘RTI Application Tracking Survey for Improving Service Delivery.’

The book- Towards Open Government- is the compilation of the 13 working papers relating to RTI which were presented in 2011 RTI National Convention organized by the FF and World Bank in Nepal. Similarly, the Success Stories from Nepal contains the case stories of the success of RTI laws in different sector including higher education, free distribution of fuel coupon, reinstatement of sacked judge, expose of multi-million VAT scam and others. FF, as a lead organization taking ahead the RTI issues in the country, prepared the book ranging the subjects from day to day life to governance. The book has chronicled interesting success stories of RTI as exposure of VAT scam and egregious misuse of petroleum products in Nepal. It divulges how ruinous, biased the government bodies were towards people. Many industrialists had evaded the tax, while only bigwigs were provided petroleum couple free of cost while the common people are hit hard with price hike of petroleum. Another appealing success story is about a judge who was sacked, for he ‘spoke against state’. The allegation proved baseless and the judge was restored. It was how a person to cater justice was a victim of injustice and was rescued with the use of RTI later. Other case stories are of equal importance.

The RTI Application Tracking Survey is the report of the survey conducted in 10 districts pertaining to RTI status in 2012.
Various other persons, including former chief information commissioner Mr Kasajoo, and officiating secretary at the information commission expressed their views.

Similarly, the RTI campaigners trained by the FF in the recent past shared their experiences from different districts on hassles about requesting for the information.

As total of 175 persons, including government officials, RTI experts, activists, campaigners, legal practitioners, civil society representatives, media persons and researchers participated in the seminar.