Jammu, October 22
People's Democratic Party (PDP) patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed may continue threatening his alliance partner, the Congress, of reviewing the coalition agreement, but he has little option to exercise at this stage. It is too late for the Mufti to do a Deve Gowda in Jammu and Kashmir.

Last week he said he was not happy with the working of the coalition government headed by Ghulam Nabi Azad of the Congress. Mufti Sayeed may have umpteen reasons to feel aggrieved, but he does not have the requisite numbers on his side. The PDP has only 16 members in the House. And of these quite a few are not prepared to withdraw support from the Congress. Prominent among them are former deputy Chief Minister Muzaffar Hussein Beg and minister Ghulam Hassan Mir.

Even if the Mufti decides to withdraw support as PDP president and his daughter Mehbooba Mufti wants, it may not lead to end of the Congress, precisely Azad's, rule in the state as Azad seems to have gained perfect control of the reins as he can look for other options like the National Conference.

His cordial relationship with the National Conference and its leader and former Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah is too well known.

Besides friendship, Farooq has other reasons to align with Azad and that is the fierce political rivalry with the PDP and its leader

Mufti. Because the PDP has mostly cut into the support base of the National Conference and that too in the Kashmir valley only.

Moreover, even when Mufti Sayeed was in the Congress, the two never enjoyed a cordial relationship between themselves. But during that time Azad limited his activities at the Centre only. But he would always encourage the groups opposed to the Mufti.

The NC has also its own limitations as it cannot afford to align with the Congress. It tried it in 1987 and that ended in a disaster.

And the current problem in the state primarily is attributed to the coalition agreement only.

But the NC can always extend tactful support to Azad which would obviously be for a limited period as elections are due in the second half of the next year. This could even mean abstaining from the vote of confidence, in case the need be there and enabling Azad to lead a minority government.

There is another option the Mufti may have to take care of. In case of Azad losing the numbers, the Governor can always ask him to continue as caretaker Chief Minister till the elections and may not recommend the President's rule.

Srinagar, October 22
If the idea behind the Central Right to Information Act, 2005, is to let the public have access to every possible information, then intention behind the J&K’s version of the Act, Jammu and Kashmir Right to Information (Amendment) Bill, 2007, seems to deny the common man every information inconvenient to the bureaucrats, its critics say. The debate over the use of ambiguous words, which are likely to be ready pretexts for officials in suppressing information, in the Bill and its limited purview has been reignited after the Governor, Lieut-Gen S.K. Sinha (retd), returned it to the government for reconsideration. A move much cheered by RTI activists.

Unlike Central, the RTI Act, which has the judiciary, including the Supreme Court, under its purview, the J-K Act leaves the judiciary outside its purview. So a state subject could obtain information on a relevant case in the apex court but he has no legal way to find details of a case going in a lower court or High Court of the state. However, what has made the activists of the organisations like the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) to doubt the state government’s motive most is that there is no provision in the Act that bars officers from asking applicants to disclose reasons for seeking information. The central RTI Act makes it clear that information officers would not ask applicants as to why they are seeking any information. And to top it all the state government has qualified the information to be given with the term “practicable”, leaving it to the mercy of information officers to decide what is practical and what not.

The information officer has been for all practical purposes vested with the power of a judge, undermining the very purpose of the Act, its critics say. The Act also seeks to appoint members of the information commission for a term of three years, unlike five years prevalent in other states.

The government’s indifferent attitude to transparency and empowering its citizens is also reflected in much-diluted punitive measures, compared to the Central Act, in the Act against officers not giving out information. The maximum penalty is Rs 5,000 and what disciplinary actions it would take against them have also not been explained, official sources said.

The CHRI says the government has shown undue haste in rushing through with the Bill, and it would be best if it is referred to a joint select committee of both Houses. The activists have also expressed their surprise as to what was the need for the government to amend the Central RTI Act when it has received people’s approval everywhere. The Raj Bhawan, sources say, has brought many of such concerns on the record before returning the Bill to the government.