Contest: 783

RIGHT TO INFORMATION

“Information is a basic human right and the fundamental foundation for

the formation of democratic institutions”.

– Nelson Mandela.

India is a democratic country. People are the masters, who have a

right to know how the Governments, meant to serve for them, are

functioning. Further, every citizen pays taxes in the form of sales tax,

excise duty, etc., when he buys a piece of soap from the market. The

citizens, therefore, have a right to know how their money was being

spent.

The background of Right to Information (RTI) goes back around the

1970’s, i.e. the case of Raj Narain vs the State of Uttar Pradesh in the

Supreme Court. In this case, Raj Narain dropped out a petition that

summoned the State Government of Uttar Pradesh to produce a

document called the ‘Blue Book’. Basically, this book contained the

information about the protection of Prime Minister of India on a tour or

travel, but his demand was declined. This was the background for the

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formation of the Right to Information Act, as this observed that people

cannot speak on about the Government affairs without any information.

The freedom of speech and expression which is embedded in the

Indian Constitution could not be used effectively, unless the Right to

Information is accessible to the citizens. RTI is not mentioned in any

three lists in the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution, as it comes under

the Residuary Powers: which basically comes under the Central

Government, where the Central Government has the power of creation

and eradication of any Rule.

RTI is a part of fundamental rights under Article 19(1) of the Indian

Constitution -- freedom of speech and expression. The primary objective

of the RTI is to empower the citizens and enable them to question the

Government, whom they have elected. Citizen needs a machinery or a

process through which he or she can exercise this fundamental right.

Right to Information Act 2005, which became effective on October 13,

2005, provides that machinery.

RTI Act does not give any new right. It simply lays down the process

on how to apply for information from various public authorities under the

Government of India and the State Governments, where to apply, how

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much fees, etc. In simple terms, a common man can question any

particular action of the Government. Under Section 10 of the RTI Act,

access may be provided to that part of the record which does not contain

information which is exempted from disclosure under this Act. There are

some exceptions, which cannot be questioned and shared to the public,

such as the internal security, relations with foreign countries, intellectual

property rights, contravention of Parliamentary privileges and

impediment of investigations.

To promote transparency and accountability in the working of the

Government, this Act helps in eradicating any type of corruption in Public

Authority by providing mandatory obligation to the Public Authority and

providing the information to the citizens of India. This really will help to

make our democracy work for the people in real sense.

As far as the features of RTI are concerned, time-bound is

considered as one of the basic objectives. There were other ways to

question the Government, even before the existence of RTI. But, the

essence of time-bound was missing, without which there is a chance of

extending it for a long period of time and getting ignored too.

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 RTI has three levels, viz. Public Information Officer (PIO), First

Appellate Authority (FAA) and Central Information Commission (CIC).

Every Government office has these three levels. As regards the PIO,

they are responsible for managing RTI applications. The PIO has an

Assistant Public Information Officer having responsibility of receiving

applications and passing them to PIOs. The time-bound for PIO is 30

days from the date of receipt by public authority. Then, moving on to the

next appeal, i.e. FAA, the time-bound for this is from 30 to 45 days, from

the date of receipt by public authority. And, the maximum time gap for

the second appeal, i.e. CIC, must be within 90 days from the date on

which the decision should have been made by the FAA. The CIC could

have one to ten Chief Information Commissioners. These

Commissioners have a tenure of five years from the date on which he

enters upon his/her office and there is no reappointment in this case

once his/her tenure ends up.

Bodies which are bounded by the RTI are constitutional bodies

under the Centre and the State bodies i.e. Legislature, Executive and

limited extent of Judiciary, NGOs even those which are financed by the

Government and privatized public utility companies.

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 As far as the exemptions are concerned, there will be no disclosure

of information (Section 8 of RTI Act) to any citizen under these subjects:

1) India’s sovereignty and integrity, 2) security 3) strategic, scientific or

economic interest of the State, 4) relationship with foreign States, 5)

Information which may constitute contempt of Court, etc.

According to Section 24 of this Act, information regarding

intelligence and security organisations from the Second Schedule

(Intelligence Bureau, the Research and Analysis Wing of the Cabinet

Secretariat, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, the Special Frontier

Force, and the Border Security Force, etc.) will not be provided.

However, there are few exceptions in this case too, the information could

be provided on allegations of corruption and human rights violation.

The positive aspects of RTI are empowerment of a common man:

this gives power to ordinary citizens of the nation to question the

Government, for example, an RTI put up in 2007 by Hemant Goswami

made Chandigarh the first smoke-free State in India, by banning smoke

in indoor and outdoor public places. Easy mode of spreading

information rightfully: this helps in protecting the information and

eradicating corruption. As the information is accessible, the graph of

corruption takes a down-curve. Transparency: this ensures the right of

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the citizens to acquire as much information that they want regarding the

Government activities, rules and regulations, etc. This creates a room for

better communication between public authorities and the citizens. This

also helps in Government-Public relation and enables greater

accountability to the citizens.

As far as the critical analysis of RTI are concerned, there are many

areas which do not come under the RTI Act such as in Judiciary and

Legislature (to a limited extent). This lessens the amount of information

that will be accessible to the citizens. All the Government organisations

were asked to put in the public general information, but this is not

followed by many institutions and there is no deadline to this provision.

Appointment of Information Commissioner is partisan, as the criteria for

their appointment is not clearly mentioned. The information is provided in

a technical language by the Government departments, which most of the

people could not understand. Awareness of this Act among the masses

is only about 36% in urban areas and 38% in rural areas. Maintenance

of information is automated and not efficient thereby giving knotted up

answer to the RTI. The cost is high, which is a basic hindrance to the

RTI, as many citizens cannot afford it.

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 Spreading of awareness and consciousness about RTI makes

people to use more which helps in strengthening the Government-Public

relationship. The public must ask sensible information with good

intentions, or else anyone can take advantage of RTI in a bad way. More

transparency should be given by minimising the exemptions.

“The purpose of information is not knowledge. It is being able to take the

right action”.

- Peter Drucker

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