Dhaka: Cabinet secretary Muhammad Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan on Saturday urged government officials to be more open to provide information to public unless it endangers security.

Noting that the Official Secrecy Act, 1923 is acting as the key obstacle to the government officials from providing information to the people, Musharraf Hossain believes time has come to change this almost one hundred years old act.

“Information is a right of all. Disclosure of information is the property of people which can’t be denied. Government officials should have the mentality to provide information unless it breaches secrecy provisions of the state,” he said.

“It won’t be enough to be aware of the right to information (RTI), we must believe it and hold the spirit of it in our minds,” he added.

The cabinet secretary came up with the remarks while addressing a seminar of Information Disclosure Policy (IDP) at Bangabandhu

International Conference Centre in the city.

Manusher Jonno Foundation, a non -government organization, and Management and Resources Development Initiative (MRDI) jointly organised the programme with the aid of Information Commission.

IDP is an internal policy consisting of responsibilities and duties of concerned officials of any authority, formulated on the basis of the Right to Information Act (RTI), stipulating rules and regulations which will be followed by the authorities to disclose information to the people, Musharraf said.

It will help the designated officers to take decisions on whether to provide or not rather than wait for approval from the higher authority due to fear, lack of guidance or official mindset, he said.

He also urged journalists to follow proper procedures while seeking data from any officials as per the RTI law.

Secretary Nazrul Islam said a total of 104 countries across the world have RTI and Bangladesh ranked 18^th in terms of qualitative measurement of the law. He stressed the need for formulating guidelines and policies on RTI to expedite and smoothen its implementation process.

Secretaries of different ministries and departments were also present at the program.