PESHAWAR: Journalism departments and universities must ensure informing people and the society at large towards the importance of Right to Information law for better access to public interest and policy.
This was stated by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Right to Information Commissioner Riaz Khan Daudzai, while speaking as chief guest at the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Peshawar, during a function titled “Talk of the Hour” on Tuesday.
During his talk to BS, masters and research students, RTI commissioner called upon students to have an urge for data driven stories through lens of journalism. He pointed out that in today’s world, public sector information (PSI) index was bringing countries to embrace foreign investment, funding and global involvement in the race of progress.
He emphasized that scrutiny of public bodies was the cry of the day due to economic recession for saving valuable taxpayers money at the best. He presented the process of RTI application from beginning to end in a simple manner that was reciprocated by students through cheers. He clarified that exception and exemptions for withholding information about public bodies was the mandate of RTI commission to decide. It is pertinent to mention here that a total number of 16,000 RTI requests were submitted by the masses till date. Of them, 9,000 were entertained by public bodies at the doorstep, while 6550 were routed through information commission, in which only 322 are in the process of adjudicating. Chairman Department of Journalism Dr Faiz Ullah Jan also spoke on the occasion.
