SHILLONG, JULY 6: Two Jaintia hills based ngos on Wednesday threatened to file a PIL seeking closure of the weighbridge at Ratacherra village in East Jaintia hills district for alleged and rampant illegal collection.
A seven-day deadline was also served to the state transport department by the Khasi-Jaintia National Union (KJNU) and Pnar Students Union (PNU) to furnish the replies on the information sought through RTI Act, 2005 two months ago.
Addressing pressmen on Wednesday, KJNU president Niman N Shadap said, “We have decided to serve a seven-day ultimatum to the authority concerned to provide the information as sought under the RTI Act.”
“if they fail, we would be compelled to file a PIL to seek the court’s intervention in closing down the Ratacherra weighbridge,” he said while informing that the ngos would also stage a black flag protest besides petitioning the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC).
The KJNU and PNU had filed the RTI since April 21, seeking information from the District Transport Office (DTO) in East Jaintia hills on the amount of money collected from the Ratacherra weighbridge.
It is also informed that the DTO had forwarded the RTI application of the ngos to the State Transport Authority (STA) in Shillong.
“Unfortunately even after two months, the authority concerned has failed to provide us the information which is a violation against the RTI Act, which states that reply should be furnish within a period of 30 days,” he said.
When asked, Shadap said that the unions decided to file the RTI after receiving several complaints especially from the public and drivers of trucks carrying goods about officials and staff of the weighbridge indulging in illegal collection.
“It was brought to our notice that the weighbridge would collect anything between Rs 2000 to Rs 3000 from trucks without giving any receipts,” he said while pointing out due to such illegal activity, trucks’ overload are allowed to ply on the national highways and state roads.
On the other hand, PNU president Kyrchan Rymbai said that there are no rules or acts to impose fine on overloading.
“As per the Meghalaya Installation Regulation, Maintenance & Operation of Weighbrige Rules 2009 & 2015, no where it has mention the need to collect fines but it only stated that in case of overloading, it is the duty of officials of weighbridge to detain the truck and release it after unloading the extra load,” he said.
He further alleged there is huge corruption involved from the way the transport authority is trying to delay information sought under the RTI. The objective of the RTI is to ensure that such weighbridges are not set up just to fill the pocket of few vested interests, Rymbai added.-By Our Reporter
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