What has the RTI Commission ordered on common issues people have asked about?

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WHAT IS RIGHT TO INFORMATION?

Public Authorities have a lot of information that is held in trust for the citizens of the country. As citizens, you now have a fundamental right to access this information. The Right to Information Act No. 12 of 2016, passed on 4th August 2016, sets out the process that citizens can use to access information. It’s is a simple process of lodging a request at the relevant Public Authority. With the normal process, you should get the information within a maximum of 28 days (if the information is a lot, or has to be obtained from a different location, it can take upto 21 days more). See more on that here.

TISL RTI NEWS LETTER

KADATHURA HERA

The first Sri Lankan film on the Right to Information showing how RTI is used through the narrative of three citizens. It will only take 30 minutes to watch this short film.

SUCCESS STORIES

RTI used to fight bribery and corruption

A staff member at the hospital forced a patient at the Vavuniya General Hospital, and the patient’s wife to pay Rs. 150,000/- as a bribe in order to speed up the medical process of the patient. After the bribe was paid, the wife reported the incident to the police, who ordered the hospital to hold

Garbage clearance due to an Information Request

Residents of Akkaraipaththu made a complaint to the Medical Officer of Health, Akkaraipaththu in May 2017, about garbage accumulation affecting 10 families and a school. The issue also went to the President via “Tell the President” in July 2017 but no action was taken. In January 2018, a RTI was filed, requesting information on the

RTI for road repairs

TISL’s Vavuniya office is situated on the Vairavar Kovil road on the 2nd cross street of Vavuniya. Renovation of this road commenced in October 2017 but was stalled ever since. This severely hampered the clients’ accessibility to the office as side canals were open and debris was around the road and in front of the

A RTI request filed on facilitating RTIs – another success in Vavuniya 

TISL made an Information Request from the Vavuniya Divisional Secretariat to obtain information about the lack of updates to the Secretariat’s website and regarding their internet speed. The site in question had not been updated since 2015. Information was also requested about the steps the Divisional Secretariat had taken to help and facilitate members of

OUR EVENTS

RTI Press Conference, RTI One Year On: Citizens’ Perspective

The 3rd of February 2018 marked one year of the implementation of the RTI Act. Recognising the achievements of the past year TISL held a press conference on the 2nd of February 2018 at the Sri Lanka Foundation at 3.00p.m.  The panellists for the conference were Sankhitha Gunaratne, Tushani Kandilpana, Nishantha Preethiraja, Vinodini Balasubramanium, Sellan

RTI Street Drama in Trinco

On the 28th of September the RTI campaign team took to the streets of Trincomalee to raise awareness on RTI.  The campaign saw a drama group performing a short skit on RTI gathering a large audience. The drama took on the form of a short and comedic narration of several individuals’ quest to receive information

Press Release on One Year of RTI

Tomorrow (3rd February 2018) marks one year since the Right to Information (RTI) Act became operational in Sri Lanka. While there remain challenges to overcome, the engagement of citizens in using RTI to hold authorities accountable as well as to resolve problems of a personal nature has been extremely encouraging. Both uses have resulted in

RTI Awareness Campaign – Colombo (2nd Day)

Priya, Navodhanie, Hiran and Sanjit constituted the team for the day. The locations covered were Colpetty market Fort Railway Station Wellawatte On the final day, the team had to overcome bad weather and heavy traffic throughout the day, which forced a reevaluation of the day’s target locations. The team’s first stop was the Colpetty market,

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