The newly appointed Governor, Ranjit Shekar Mooshahary, has one major worry: how to curtail corruption in the state.

The Governor believes that the Right to Information (RTI) can act “as a tool to fight corruption”. This comes as no surprise as after retiring from the Indian Police Service, Mooshahary worked as the Chief Information Commissioner of Assam and led the RTI movement from the front there. Though the Raj Bhavan has its own limitations in waging a war against corruption, Mooshahary can surely influence and inspire people to effectively use the RTI as a weapon to uncover corruption and punish the guilty.

Meghalaya has not really used the RTI widely. However, the state saw a flurry of accusations of corruption against most the sitting MLAs, based on RTI reports, just before the March 3 Assembly polls. Some of the legislators against whom accusation of misutilisation of MLA schemes was made, based on the RTI reports, did lose the election, but many others sailed through. Thus, it is debatable whether it was the RTI revelation or anti-incumbency factor that led to the defeat of the legislators.

In fact, none of the NGOs, who usually make noises about corruption prevailing in the state, has filed an RTI to unearth corruption.

The minimal use of RTI Act does not, however, suggest that corruption in Meghalaya is also minimal. In fact, the India Corruption Study 2007 says that corruption in Meghalaya is “alarming”. Mooshahary had described the Northeast, including Meghalaya, as “trapped in a whirlpool of corruption” after the report was released.

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