Freedom Forum welcomes the recent decision of the National Information Commission (NIC) to write a letter to the Election Commission Nepal ordering it not to create any hassle to the citizens while registering right to information applications as per RTI Act. Earlier, Aditya Dahal, on behalf of FF, had appealed to the NIC, complaining about the registration procedure at the Election Commission which requires the signature of the authorized person of the commission before registration of RTI application. "Such procedure of approval before registration of the RTI request has caused trouble in requesting and seeking information because we have to search and wait for the officer to sign on the application which is time-consuming and full of hassle", said RTI activist Dahal. Claiming that the procedure of approval is non-scientific and against the norms of RTI Act which guarantees each and every citizen's right to request information at public offices, NIC on its September 23, 2021, decision stated that the public agencies should be citizen-friendly, thereby ensuring effective service delivery. Furthermore, in another decision, the NIC reminded the public bodies on fee to be charged on information seeking as per RTI Act. The decision reads: The NIC has learnt about confusion surfacing on the fee of information provided to the citizens for their RTI request, to which, the Commission orders the public bodies to provide information up to ten pages for free and for more than ten pages the fee should be as stated in the guideline.
FF welcomes NIC reminder to EC on RTI application filing
