When 12th-pass jobless Dinesh Kumar Maheshwari applied for the coveted post of information commissioner in Madhya Pradesh in January this year, he was merely 19 years old. Yet, he is confident of doing justice to the post, if he gets it.
But then he has to compete with 116 others, including judges, senior IAS and IPS officers and lawyers who have applied for the two posts of information commissioners in the state.
When asked what he knew about the job profile, Maheshwari said, “It is only after I get the job that I will come to know what type of work I will be required to do. What I know is, it is related to RTI as to how information should be given under the RTI Act.”
Maheshwari, who belongs to Shajapur and is staying in Bhopal pursuing a pathology test course, said there was no qualification required for the post. Only certain “descriptions” were required to be mentioned which “I did on the form”.
Another applicant Mahendra Maheshwari from Sehore is a graduate and labourer. He told HT that he chanced upon an ad for the post and applied.
On the eligibility and qualification for the job, he said, “Since I am preparing for various government jobs I have good deal of knowledge on law, media, RTI, governance etc. I have good intention and wish to serve the country.”
Brijesh Sen from Sehore and Vishal Gujarati from Agar Malwa are two other applicants with educational qualification of higher secondary. While Vishal has not mentioned his occupation, Brijesh is a labourer, as per information obtained by RTI activist Ajay Dubey.
The last date for submitting the application was January 10.
As per Right to Information Act, chief information commissioner and information commissioners shall be persons of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance.
As per RTI Act, a committee comprising chief minister, leader opposition and a minister nominated by the CM recommends selection of the state CIC and information commissioners. The committee is yet to meet to take its decision on the applications. Recently, leader opposition leader Ajay Singh of Congress warned that he would not take a part in the meeting if the parliamentary affairs minister Narottam Mishra is a part of the committee.
Activist Ajay Dubey said the lacunae in the RTI act should be plugged to rule out appointment of those less qualified. Unfortunately, he said, there were many applicants who didn’t have much knowledge about RTI and they had hardly worked in the field of RTI.
However, information commissioner Aatmdeep said ‘persons of eminence’ was enough to carry the implied meaning as to who should be appointed to the post.
“The post of information commissioner is not a mundane job,” he said, adding that undeserving candidates would be filtered in the process.
Aatmdeep noted that there have hardly any cases of undeserving persons being appointed as information commissioners.
