BANGALORE: The effective use of The Right to Information Act emerged as a winner while identifying solutions to fight corruption, at a Workshop on ‘Corruption Free Governance in Bangalore and the role of civil society’ held here on Saturday.Representatives of 14 residential associations from Bangalore East gathered at the Medico Pastoral Association to participate in this workshop conducted by the Eshanya Bengalurina Kalyana Sanghagala Okkutta (EKKSO). Other solutions include insistence on acknowledgement slips with date of receipt from public officials and the use of RTI to find out whether any delay at work was deliberate to active participation by resident welfare associations in promoting transparency and monitoring of works.It had also invited officials from civic agencies to talk about mechanisms installed within their institutions to eradicate corruption.Representing the police, Deputy Commissioner of Police (East) Chandrashekhar said that the department had identified major areas of corruption. “We have also identified officers with doubtful integrity. We try and make sure they do not handle areas where corruption is rampant,” he said.He however dismissed the idea of issuing acknowledgement receipts to all persons approaching the police for help as “giving an acknowledgement makes accountability mandatory,” he said. Meanwhile, Vigilance Officer, Lokayukta, Munikrishna said that certainty of punishment is better than severity of punishment and that officers found guilty must be penalised.He suggested that solutions should be varied as corruption was ‘innovative’ and existed in ‘protean’ forms.EKKSO president Shivashankaran however said that officials, on receiving an application, tend to focus on what was wrong with the application format rather than addressing the issue. “These are often mechanisms to delay action,” he said and informed them about such tactics practised by Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP).
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