Saqib Ali Haidri
Muzaffarabad: A survey was conducted under the aegis of Capital Journalist Forum to know the need of “Right to Information” Law in and its enforcement in Azad Jammu and Kashmir.
A single question was asked in survey to almost 2100 persons living in capital city.
Question was “Should Right To Information Law be implemented in AJK?” On which three options were mentioned in answer 1-Yes,2-No,3-Don’t know.
Among these people, ninety five percent answered the question as “Yes” and only one percent answered it as “No” and four percent either didn’t give answer or choosed third option.
This survey was conducted randomly and some persons among politicians, lawyers, journalists, civil society members and students were asked to answer this question.
Around 2000 people answered this question as “Yes” and only 14 persons said “No” and almost 100 people either said “Don’t know” or did not give any answer.
Right to Information Law was implemented in Federal as well as in KPK and punjab in 2013, while Baluchistan presented its bill in 2015 and Sindh government enforced it in 2016 but still citizens of AJK are looking forward for its implementation.
This law is also known as “freedom of Information law” internationally.
Most of the politicians answered this question either Don’t know or did not answer, and few of them answered as ‘Yes’.
President Capital Journalists Forum Tariq Naqash told this correspondent that our forum first initiative was to aware journalists about their rights and we always reiterate for the implementation of Right to Information Law within the State.
As per survey, a large number of people demanded AJK government to enforce the “Right to Information Law” within the state.