Jethava was India’s sixth RTI activist murdered
Jethava was India’s sixth RTI activist murdered
Ahmedabad, DeshGujarat, 21 July, 2010
Mr. Amit Jethwa, a wild-life activist who fought bravely for the protection of wild-life in using RTI as his main tool, was shot dead on 21st July around 8.15 p.m. near Gujarat high court. Today (22nd July) around 8.45 p.m. many nature lovers and RTI activists, gathered at the site where he was shot and burnt candles to pay homage to his soul.
“Amit Jethwa was a true fighter, and an aggressive RTI user. His mission would not remain in unfinished mode after his death,” said Harinesh Pandya who runs an RTI(Right to information) NGO in Gujarat.
Pandya said, Amit’s working style was to seek information first, and then on the bases of that information he would put the government machinery under pressure. If government would not work, Amit would challenge the government in court.
Pandya said, ff governments start working well effectively and efficiently on its own, the activists can rest and enjoy their life, but because the government doesn’t work enough, the activists have to fight for justice, and even have to sacrifice their life. So far in India total five RTI activists, fighting for public cause were murdered. Amit was sixth.
Copies of some documents of Amit Jethwa’s RTI application and petitions are available at Pandya’s Ahmedabad office. The documents show that Jethwa had asked information about alleged wrongdoings of Pipavav Port, Essar Oil, Gujarat government, Geology department, Mines department, Forest department, Reliance Petroleum, Ashapura mines, GMDC, and dozens of other departments and companies.
Pandya says, Jethwa’s paper work was solid, and he was not avoidable, as he was never ready to leave the issues half-finished or unfinished.
| << Previous Post |
We would like to hear from our CM on such issues..
Until the nexus between the politicians, police and lobbyists are not broken, these sad incidents will keep happening. This was a shocking incident and it only reflects that fact that in our so called Democracy, it is still unsafe to raise voice against wrong doers consistently. Governments in any part of the world are not perfect and won’t be perfect because lots of personnel in hundreds of department have to do million of jobs and not all of them are honest. It is almost impossible to keep an eye on everyone and that is why it is necessary to have vigil citizens like Late Shri Amit Jethawa who can keep an eye on things.
But more importantly, we need tougher laws for corruption and financial scams, special protection for whistle blowers, maximum use of information technology making the system fullproof to make it tough to forge documents. And even more important is to hire honest and hard working people who can work their back off to fulfill the needs. Obviously, the must be paid well enough.
Hopefully, the situation will improve with combining all those factors so to lessen the need of activists like Amit Jethawa. I really admire Narendra Modi’s effort to eliminate the middlemen with these Garib Kalyan Mela and I think the more it is applied in different setting, the better it is. As per the famous quote uttered by Late Rajiv Gandhi that only 15 paisa out of 1 Rs reaches the poor. Hopefully, that will improve with time. But till that time, a lot needs to be done. And I sincerely wish that, Shri Jethawa’s killers and their masterminds are nabbed as soon as possible and punished severely.
This is the situation of OUR INDIAN POLITICS…..
REMEMBER in democracy THE rich will stay rich at the expense of POOR…. LOBBYISTS run the GOVT. for selfish agenda…. Situation is not going to change much when majority people have to struggle to only survive….. There is no easy answer.
I like your analysis Dr. MEHTA. When late P.M. himself said that about corruption , what more proof you need….. The conspiracy to kill Mr. JETHVA must be cleaned otherwise there may be many problems for the future of NATION…. Mr. MODIJI is trying but he is one person and many are so much corrupted and entire system THE WHOLE GENERATION grew up with corruption ( GIFT OF CONGRESS PARTY) will not change overnight…. WE ARE OUR PROBLEM… Many I have talked say that nothing will change, CORRUPTION IS IN OUR BLOOD…. We all will suffer…..THERE IS NO HOPE…… still I AM OPTIMISTIC….THANKS…
hey you idealists without knowledge who react only to what u see….read this comment from knowldgeable commenter …to congress owned media like ndtv
you are highlighting such cases but you highlight cases which happen in BJP ruled states but forget about other states like Haryana
where rti activist who carried out STING OPERATION AGAINST POLICE ATS OF STATE FOR DEMANDING MONEY WAS ELIMINATED AND YOU HAVE NOT EVEN SPOKEN ABOUT IT.Police seems to be more powerful than your channel
ur idealism is all selective and lipservice..india is the ppoorest and most looted country but u dont even know facts about swissbanks assets being # 1 for india even if poorest becase media hides it….
and if pil is lauched in SC..all the congress rich crooks hide it and suppress it and then peole like dev do not know because of their lazy ignorance…and congresmedia conspiracy succeeds in targeting bjp….
shame on your limited knowledge…whre was r idealism for peole kiled by poverty which leads to bad health care,more children and deaths due to that….u guys dont even know that india has the largest prro and most swiss bank loot…ha ha waht idealist ur …..peole like devan just come her to moralize and show off….if u care fu shuld do this fore whole of india…..
but u r tageting the best stdnet gujarat and its cm for a few rong answers but congres sdesrves to get negative marks for its loot and jhoot of 60 yers and u r basically helping it in its agenda aginst modi who is honest….do u expect him to be responsible for milions of bjp mebers …is this even humanly possible in this corrupt rot of 60 yrs….go and file rti against sonia and bharadwaj for qutroch i and raja ….disgusting that peole like devan r playing into media hands when the police investigation is going on…..and not evn waiting…
comment by shyam…..very logical and insightful
congress is exploiting this with its hindu bjp hating media but none of this would have happened if not for congress 60 yr misrule…that rti is required itself is a joke about congress misrule….and the best part is this evil gang is targeting the much better bjp that stands in the way of its continuing misrule to destroy india…..so why does not anyone think like the commenter who posted elsewhere ..see how intelligent and knowledgeable this comment below is by someone called prashant….and see the simplistic lip service tears of of people here ….only nadaan hindus can be like this…and some r not naddan but cunning like jaichand in media and even here…
prashant says…Why RTI is required in the first place. It should be Government’s obligation to put all information regarding any contract and decision in public and internet is the best and cheapest medium, They should publish all decisions taken for public. Publishing is mandatory for listed cos to save public shareholders. Then why it’s not mandatory to publish all information about Government contracts and decision when the whole Government is run on public money and for public. 100 % transparency is required. Only defence should not be transparent everything else should be transparent.
If anybody wants some information about a contract he should be able to know who got the contract and at what price. Any contract value is always at more than 50% price than what can be possible in market. RTI is a wrong tool for right cause. Better way would be Mandatory Publishing Of Information (MPI) act instead of RTI. Public must have ready not easy access to information. It should not be required to demand information. Why demand? It should be available by default. In future either no one will use RTI or RTI will take many more lives. Nothing is going to happen. Indian politicians are smarter than media and all india taken together. They will devise ways to hide information and bring order in administration. So the smarts will rule why bother ? They are unstoppable. See the railway accidents, 60 yrs have gone, no system to stop the accidents. If heaven is there, there has to be hell!