World Development 136 (2020) 105088

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World Development
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev

More than a decade in the making: A study of the implementation of

India’s Right to Information Act
Jeannine E. Relly a,⇑, Md. Fazle Rabbi b, Meghna Sabharwal b, Rajdeep Pakanati c, Ethan H. Schwalbe d
a
The University of Arizona, School of Journalism, 845 North Park Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85721, United States
b
The University of Texas at Dallas, School of Economic, Political and Policy Studies, United States
c
O.P. Jindal Global University, Jindal School of International Affairs, India
d
The University of Arizona, School of Journalism, United States

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: India’s progressive Right to Information Act (RTIA) is a global model. The RTIA was adopted a decade and
Accepted 8 July 2020 a half ago to serve as a check on corruption and to advance democracy, citizen equity and public account-
Available online 4 August 2020 ability. Little primary research has been conducted on the implementation of the RTIA. This research
employs a socio-political and technocratic framework to study influences on RTIA implementation over
Keywords: time from the citizen requester ‘demand-side’ and the governmental ‘supply-side’ from an institutional
India development process perspective. Our constructivist approach utilizes in-depth semi-structured inter-
Right to Information Act
views from frequent information requesters and information commissioners (N = 114) and a new dataset
Freedom of Information laws
Implementation
of a random stratified sample of information commissioner decisions for release of information under the
Institutional development RTIA (N = 500). We found that political will, bureaucratic culture, and societal activism and engagement
Government transparency were the strongest overarching socio-political factors impacting implementation. Socio-political subfac-
Bureaucratic culture tors that appeared weak or wanting in the RTI regime were leadership, oversight, coordination, positive
Development workplace incentives, reflexivity, and public information officer communication style with citizen
Corruption requesters. Technocratic constraints, directly influenced by socio-political factors that impact implemen-
tation, included follow-through on administrative policies and rules, capacity building, monitoring, over-
sight, and sanctions. This study found that technocratic factors included in the institutional design of RTI
legislation may not be sufficient for short-term institutional change in cultures of bureaucratic secrecy.
However, coalitions of citizens, civil society organizations, media, engaged public officials, and interested
politicians can drive a transparency agenda in a country when political will and bureaucratic leadership
are weak.
Ó 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

1. Introduction accountability. The institutional design of the progressive law was

India has one of the strongest legal frameworks for Freedom of
Information (FOI)-type1 legislation in the world. The country’s Right
to Information Act (RTIA), which grants citizens the right to request
and receive information from their government, is in the top 10
among the 128 countries with such legislation (Access Info Europe
and Centre for Law and Democracy, 2020). The Act was adopted as
a check on corruption and to advance equity, democracy, and
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: jrelly@email.arizona.edu (J.E. Relly), mxr163630@utdallas.edu
(M.F. Rabbi), mxs095000@utdallas.edu (M. Sabharwal), rpakanati@jgu.edu.in (R.
Pakanati), ehschwalbe@arizona.edu (E.H. Schwalbe).
1
This study uses the terms ‘‘FOI” and ‘‘RTI” law interchangeably, recognizing that
most every law is different. The term, ‘‘RTI,” often is used in India in referring to the
legislation.
heralded by legal experts and information rights advocates for its
path-breaking provisions: securing free access to information for
the poor; covering all branches of government; requiring penalties
and disciplinary actions for administrative noncompliance; and
promising information officer assistance for applicants who are
literacy-challenged or visually impaired (Right to Information Act,
2005).
Global interest in India’s citizen-driven mobilization for adop-
tion and use of the RTIA in the world’s largest democracy has been
strong. Harvard University’s Kennedy School has a case study of
‘‘the birth of a people’s movement in India.” The World Bank Group
studied civil society work leading up to the adoption of the RTIA
(Puddephatt, 2009). The U.N. Development Program (2017) fea-
tured the movement around information rights in a social change
series and leaders are invited to speak about their grassroots

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105088
0305-750X/Ó 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
2 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
activism work for information rights. There have been robust
scholarly and other accounts of civil society organization, social
activist, and Right to Information (RTI) work focused on decades
of activism around the information rights-based movement
(Jenkins & Goetz, 1999; Puddephatt, 2009; Roy with the MKSS
Collective, 2018; Sharma, 2015; Singh, 2007, 2010). However, a
decade and a half after India’s Right to Information Act adoption
in 2005, only a thin line of academic research examines implemen-
tation and those studies primarily were in the legislation’s first
years with the use of largely secondary data (Agrawal, 2012;
Calland & Bentley, 2013; Roberts, 2010; Srivastava, 2010).
This study, which largely uses primary data with supplemen-
tary secondary data over time, fills an important research gap in
the global development literature: Adoption of RTI-laws often sig-
nals public accountability initiatives, theoretically creating a stron-
ger environment for financial investment and economic
development. Our study examines more than a decade of the law
and how it operated within a country with an emerging and
diverse economy and the world’s second largest population. Our
work also explores complex issues that arise when citizens who
have used the law to expose corruption face threats, harassment
and blackmail.
Our overarching research question examines factors that have
impacted implementation of the RTIA at the state and national
levels from the citizen requester ‘demand-side’ perspective and
the government ‘supply-side.’ We develop a framework to examine
‘ideal-type’ institutional design factors in the creation, use, and
implementation of RTI laws. The study found that some cultures
of bureaucratic secrecy in India could not be cracked by RTI legis-
lation, but that coalitions of citizens, civil society organizations,
media, engaged public sector decision-makers, and interested
politicians have driven a transparency agenda in the country when
political will and bureaucratic leadership were weak.
2. Literature review
With the global diffusion of RTI laws in the last quarter century,
there has been a rise in the study of access to public information as
a citizen’s right and a human right (Ackerman & Sandoval-
Ballesteros, 2006; Bovens, 2002; Cramer, 2009; Mendel, 2008;
Snell & Sebina, 2007). Research also has explored the types of
RTI-based legislation adopted since the breakup of the Soviet
Union (Busch, Jörgens, & Tews, 2005; Florini, 2007; Michener,
2011; Relly, 2012; Roberts, 2006). Importantly, some studies have
examined the adoption and implementation process and how it is
affected by government, political and civil society organizations,
including nongovernmental and intergovernmental organizations,
media (Berliner & Erlich, 2015; Berliner, 2016; Camaj, 2016a,
2016b, 2018; Michener, 2015a; Piotrowski, 2007; Puddephatt,
2009; Singh, 2010; Worthy, 2017), and global development associ-
ations (Cramer, 2009; Darch & Underwood, 2010; Grigorescu,
2003; Michener, 2015b). Evidence demonstrates that governments
have adopted Freedom of Information and Right to Information
legislation for various reasons ranging from an intent to advance
transparency, accountability and good governance to mere
window-dressing (Berliner, 2017; Berliner & Erlich, 2015; Camaj,
2016a, 2016b; Michener, 2015a; Roberts, 2006).
A recent trend in RTI research studies the efficiency and effec-
tiveness of how the laws are put into practice, as more than half
of the nations in the world have adopted the legislation (Access
Info Europe and Centre for Law and Democracy, 2020). Such a turn
in research is logical as adoption of an RTI law does not guarantee
its implementation will reflect institutional design nor desired
results. Though RTI laws have been linked to nations’ development
goals and have been found to enhance transparency and account-
ability in government, or the perception of those positive results
(Agrawal, 2012; Berliner, Bagozzi, & Palmer-Rubin, 2018; Hazell
& Worthy, 2010; Peisakhin & Pinto, 2010; Roberts, 2010; Worthy,
2010; Worthy, John & Vannoni, 2017), the overall outcome is less
effective than expected. Poor and inconsistent implementation
and compliance are quite common (Birkinshaw, 2002; Camaj,
2016a, 2016b; Cuillier, 2010; Darbishire & Carson, 2006; Darch &
Underwood, 2010; Dokeniya, 2013; Hazell & Worthy, 2010;
Michener, 2011; Michener, Velasco, Contreras & Rodrigues, 2019;
Roberts, 2006, 2010; Rodríguez & Rossel, 2018; Snell, 2001,
2006). Some studies in emerging economies in which RTI promised
a new era in combatting corruption and contributing to economic
development have shown that the legislation had little impact in
those areas (Camaj, 2016a, 2016b; Darbishire & Carson, 2006;
Darch & Underwood, 2010; Michener, Contreras, & Niskier,
2018). We thus suggest the implementation of RTI legislation
and the ultimate outcome of this type of information-rights based
legislation requires further examination.
Several RTI implementation studies demonstrate aspects of a
framework developed by Julnes and Holzer (2001), whose work
proposes that policy adoption, in general, is dominantly influenced
by technocratic approaches while the policy implementation is
influenced more by socio-political approaches. However, we see
the approaches as critically interdependent for implementation.
For this study, we define technocratic approach2 as governmental
or civil society work focused on the instrumental aspects of imple-
menting the laws’ efficiency, policy and rule-making, and systems
development (Esmark, 2017, p. 511). In contrast, we define socio-
political approaches to RTI law implementation as organized initia-
tives or programs in ‘the public interest’ as well as more discreet cul-
tural actions or inactions. These behaviors may have symbolic
meaning and include language, beliefs, traditions, and rituals, which
may underlie practices within groups or organizations, particularly
related to social change (Noordegraaf & Vermeulen, 2010, p. 516;
North, 2004; Swidler, 1986, p. 273). We approach these socio-
political phenomena as potential sources of ambiguity and complex-
ity within the various levels of the public sector in India and note
there likely are similarities to this case around the world
(Noordegraaf & Vermeulen, 2010, p. 517). We suggest there is a need
to develop a conceptual framework that allows researchers to study
the relationships among these approaches as they shape RTI imple-
mentation within diverse historical contexts, geographical and tech-
nological spaces, and other conditions that may affect prospective
‘‘strategies of action” (Swidler, 1986, p. 284).
2.1. Framework
Our framework engages internal and external technocratic and
socio-political approaches that influence the execution of RTI laws.
‘Internal’ factors are inside the government, or the ‘supply’ side;
and the ‘demand’ side, or ‘external’ factors, are on the public side
(Julnes & Holzer, 2001). Table 1 demonstrates the interconnected
nature of these factors.
2.1.1. Technocratic approaches: internal and external factors
Based on the RTI-law implementation literature focused on
technocratic approaches, a host of factors inside and outside of
government are necessary for such legislation to be most effective.
In various country contexts, as Table 1 notes, a key internal factor
2
We acknowledge the meaning related to the technocratic approach concept was
drawn originally from Frederick Winslow Taylor’s scientific management, which
advanced the notion that with adequate data and expertise, issues could be resolved
or addressed without involving politics or ideology. This line of reasoning later was
reformed into the New Public Management (NPM) and post-NPM, which ‘‘embue
technocratic” thinking (Esmark, 2017, p. 511).
 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
Table 1
‘‘Ideal-type” institutional design factors in the RTI law implementation context.
from a technocratic approach includes committing resources to
rolling out and upholding the RTI law, for without adequate fund-
ing and resourcing, RTI laws can be undermined (Darch &
Underwood, 2010; Roberts, 1998; Snell, 2001, 2006). Moreover,
researchers and practitioners argue that information rights legisla-
tion is most effective when governments create policies, rules,
reporting requirements and capacity building systems and also
train citizens and public sector workers to apply and follow the
laws (Camaj, 2016a, 2016b, 2018; Darch & Underwood, 2010).
Structurally, necessary conditions include providing professional
development, incentives, and strong support for innovation, proac-
tive disclosure, and the management and archiving of records
(Dokeniya, 2013; Kim, 2008; Neuman & Calland, 2007;
Piotrowski, 2007; Piotrowski, Zhang, Lin & Yu, 2009; Roberts,
1998; Snell, 2001, 2006). Governments with an independent
agency to evaluate use and effectiveness have been linked to
strong implementation (Hazell & Worthy, 2010; Holsen &
Pasquier, 2012; Michener et al., 2018; Neuman & Calland, 2007).
Researchers have measured these internal technocratic factors.
In Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and the U.K., perfor-
mance measurements have studied volume of information
requests, time taken to respond, positive and negative responses,
and appeals to decisions by governments (Hazell & Worthy,
2010). In China, scholarship has assessed resources committed to
undertaking information-access legislation and the technocratic
implementation of internal systems such as creating guides and
catalogues, training, oversight and coordination, and building gov-
ernmental capacity through record keeping and an incentive sys-
tem (Piotrowski, Zhang, Lin & Yu, 2009). In emerging democratic
political systems in Southeast Europe, technocratic factors such
as oversight mechanisms have been found to be limited and weak
(Camaj, 2016a; Grigorescu, 2002, 2003).
A more limited body of research has examined the public (or
‘demand’) side of the technocratic approach (as noted in Table 1),
providing support from outside of government to ensure RTI legis-
lation is operating as intended. As new democracies and autocra-
cies around the world have adopted RTI legislation over more
than 25 years, academics and open-government advocates have
reported that non-governmental groups and organizations have
3
provided input, including developing policies needed to opera-
tionalize the legislation, devising records systems and records
management, even offering public sector employee and citizen
training (Berliner, 2016; Camaj, 2018; Darbishire & Carson, 2006;
Jenkins & Goetz, 1999; Michener, 2011; Puddephatt, 2009;
Roberts, 2006; Roy with the MKSS Collective, 2018; Sharma,
2015; Singh, 2007, 2010; Szekely, 2007). In some countries, this
often citizen-led technocratic support has been from domestic
and international sources. Social accountability mechanisms, such
as audits, monitoring, and evaluating of RTI laws, have been carried
out by transnational organizations, donor nation contractors, or
groups such as Transparency International or the Open Society Jus-
tice Initiative (Carter Center, n.d.; Darbishire & Carson, 2006; Darch
& Underwood, 2010; Neuman & Calland, 2007; Roberts, 2006). In a
few countries, researchers have found a limited number of civil
society organizations involved in these technocratic approaches,
conducting ongoing audits, assisting with filing requests, appeals,
and public interest litigation (Camaj, 2018; Neuman & Calland,
2007; Roberts, 2006; Roberts, 2010). India’s grassroots and
national level network approaches to participatory governance
and social accountability have been described as among the most
notable in the world (Puddephatt, 2009; Roberts, 2010; Sharma,
2015; Singh, 2007, 2010). These externally driven technocratic pro-
cesses run parallel to government initiatives.
The literature also has shown that social and political activists,
civil society organization and news media outlets serve a social
accountability role and have fought amendments that weaken
RTI-type legislation, acting as sentinels (Foerstel, 1999). These
interventions include public interest litigation to uphold informa-
tion rights and assisting with shepherding companion legislation,
such as whistleblower protection laws, that protect citizens from
bad actor exposure when damaging information is unearthed
(Foerstel, 1999; Gans-Morse, Borges, Makarin, Mannah-Blankson,
Nickow, & Zhang, 2018; Mendel, 2008). Civil society groups also
develop strategies to ensure RTI compliance of public organiza-
tions. By holding social audits (Jenkins & Goetz, 1999), producing
assessment reports (Roberts, 2010) and sharing them with news
media (Silver, 2016), civil society organizations make public offi-
cials directly accountable to citizens.
4 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
2.1.2. Socio-political approach: internal and external factors
The strength and engagement of civil society and the socio-
political environment for policy making related to implementing
RTI laws are critical factors in the long-term health of transparency
legislation. Internal socio-political factors considered key for RTI
policy and program development are positive organizational (man-
agement) attitudes and an ideology toward openness and innova-
tion, all crucial to breaking down cultures of secrecy and advancing
RTI statutes (Neuman & Calland, 2007; Piotrowski et al, 2009;
Roberts, 2000). These internal, or governmental, factors include
organization member goals that support openness (Roberts,
1998; Snell, 2001, 2006; Darch & Underwood, 2010). Such an
administrative orientation has been described as ‘proactive’ in pro-
viding information in the public interest without requests, making
information requests a priority, advancing the goal of releasing the
most information possible, and dedicating public sector officers to
records management (Neuman & Calland, 2007; Roberts, 1998;
Snell, 2001, 2006; Piotrowski & Rosenbloom, 2002).
‘Political will,’ or the politics of implementation, strongly
impacts the socio-political approach from the ‘supply’ side or
administrative effectiveness of an RTI-type law (Table 1). The
choice to staff government agencies that respond to public
requests for information can be political, for example, as can con-
ditions for funding, and appointments for oversight and enforce-
ment (Hazell & Worthy, 2010; Michener et al., 2018). Internal
interest groups with intrinsic motivation, ideology aligned with
openness, a culture of risk-taking, and a ‘‘maximum release” orien-
tation have been catalysts in some countries for transforming
bureaucratic culture (Snell, 2006). Indeed, these nuclei of adminis-
trative ‘‘interest groups” inside government were instrumental in
some laws being adopted (Horsely, 2007) and have been the bed-
rock of vibrant and dynamic organizational cultures that support
public use of RTI legislation (Gans-Morse et al., 2018; Singh,
2007, 2010; Sharma, 2015).
In contrast, scholarship has pointed to socio-political
approaches that are detrimental to the implementation of RTI-
type laws in many countries. Camaj (2016a) found lack of political
commitment (political will) contributed to noncompliance with
the law. Moreover, legal statutes requiring transparency are not
apt to fulfill their destiny without ‘‘profound cultural change”
(Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2007, p. 147). The cost of institutional
change is not insignificant and may not be a priority in resource-
strapped countries; also political risk exists when information
unearthed by public records requests could put bureaucrats or
politicians in unfavorable light (Berliner, 2017; Berliner, Bagozzi,
& Palmer-Rubin, 2018; Michener & Worthy, 2018). Exposure of
corruption through the release of public records has led some pub-
lic officials to withhold information. These governmental (internal)
or ‘supply-side’ phenomena related to administrative behaviors
have led to ‘‘administrative noncompliance,” ‘‘adversarialism,”
and ‘‘malicious noncompliance” (Darch & Underwood, 2010; Kim,
2008; Roberts, 1998; Snell, 2001, 2006; Szekely, 2007).
Socio-political issues related to RTI laws are not new. After the
U.S. FOI Act (1966) should have ended a long period of secrecy,
government agencies at that time did not cooperate with public
requests for information (Foerstel, 1999). More than a half century
later, we see many examples of socio-political barriers to imple-
menting the letter of the law. A number of former Soviet states
and their satellites adopted RTI legislation when they broke away
from the Soviet Union, yet those working in the public sector with
legacies of secrecy continued on even with the political transitions
(Camaj, 2016a, 2016b; Grigorescu, 2002; Szekely, 2007). Such
examples are not isolated.
External socio-political factors tied to access to information
environments often include networks of civil society organizations,
grassroots groups, news media, and even politicians and adminis-
trators who support transparency. Research has established that
‘‘without an adequately developed ‘demand (requester) side,’
information-access regimes are ‘‘likely to wither on the vine”
(Neuman & Calland, 2007, p. 181) or become ‘‘dead letters”
(Ackerman & Sandoval-Ballesteros, 2006). A thin strand of research
focuses on civil society organization work around information
rights, collective action, and social change activism, demonstrating
how agenda building can increase awareness about the laws, how
to use them, and even grow demand (Camaj, 2018; Pinto, 2009). In
contrast, weakness in enforcing RTI laws has been linked to low
internal demand for information and underdeveloped civil society
and media in some Eastern European countries (Camaj, 2016a;
Grigorescu, 2002; Szekely, 2007). Involvement of civil society orga-
nizations, grassroots organizations, media and citizens in both use
of RTI and oversight activities is critical, as is using an appeals pro-
cess when information is denied; citizen awareness, too, stokes
demand for information (Calland & Bentley, 2013; Camaj, 2016b;
Dokeniya, 2013; Michener, 2011; Piotrowski et al., 2009), which
is necessary in keeping the rights alive.
3. Methodology
This research examines how the progressive Indian Right to
Information Act operates from both the citizen requester, or ‘de-
mand’ (external) perspective, and the governmental ‘supply’ (in-
ternal) side. We employ a combinatorial technocratic and socio-
political framework to analyze the process of institutional develop-
ment and change over time. Because the RTIA has been recognized
for its language offering free access to information for the poor,
assistance to those with physical constraints, and its built-in
accountability measures of sanctions for noncompliance, we
researched the lived experiences of information requesters in India
(Right to Information Act, 2005). We also used 10 years of primary
data from Central Information Commissioner decisions on whether
or not to release information.
To study implementation, we utilize in-depth semi-structured
interviews with a purposive sample of heavy users of the Indian RTIA
in 20 cities and towns; supplemental reports; and a random strati-
fied sample of a census of 10 years of Central Information Commis-
sion (CIC) decisions on releasing information (2006–2016). This
database was shared with us by the government of India. Our unit
of analysis for the requester side of the study is the largest and most
active RTIA requester community in India, which the literature
suggests contains journalists, civil society organization representa-
tives and social activists (PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2009; Right to
Information Assessment and Advocacy Group, 2014). Thus, journal-
ists, social activists and civil society organization representatives
(n = 111) were recruited into the study for their expertise as frequent
utilizers of the RTIA. We recruited Information Commissioners from
the Central Information Commission (n = 3) for this study to triangu-
late the data. We utilized other scholarly work, transcripts of Infor-
mation Commissioner meetings, and governmental and civil society
organization reports to develop interview questionnaires (Camaj,
2016a, 2018; Research Assessment, 2017a, 2017b; Roberts, 2010)
and to supplement and contextualize our data for the period from
the year the legislation was adopted – 2005 through 2019, the most
recent full year of implementation.
We received university Institutional Review Board approval for
the study, which was launched at the 10-year anniversary of the
RTIA. We recruited study participants by phone and email. In-
depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted from May 5,
2015, to June 4, 2017, with several follow-ups in 2020. Fig. 1 shows
cities and towns where study participants were based in the north,
south, east, west and central regions of the country.
 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
Fig. 1. Locations of research participants in the study.
In the first phase of the study, we recruited 42 journalists from
16 of the 20 largest newspapers in the country along with small
news outlets, start-ups, and large broadcast-news outlets. Fifty-
eight civil society organization representatives and 11 Right to
Information social activists were recruited into the study from
throughout the country. To triangulate our findings and supple-
mentary secondary data, we also recruited three information com-
missioners from the Central Information Commission in New
Delhi. Semi-structured interview guides were utilized for 110
face-to-face interviews, one phone and three Skype interviews.
We audio-recorded interviews with participants’ permission.
Indian research assistants translated audio from Hindi to English
and then transcribed it, or simply transcribed the English-
language audio recordings. A numeric system is used to identify
participants in the study throughout the findings. We use our
framework (Table 1) to analyze primary and secondary data
related to implementation of the RTIA.
In the second phase of the study, we utilized a census of data
provided to us by the Indian Central Information Commission
(CIC), upon request, to study documentation patterns within com-
missioners’ decision orders at the last point in the appeals process
before those appeals are filed in court. If a seeker is not satisfied
with the government’s initial response to a request for information,
under the RTIA it goes to the First Appellate Authority followed by
appealing to the Second Appellate Authority for another review;
the electronic archive we examined contained 190,462 decisions
on the requesters’ second appeals. We took a random stratified
sample (N = 500) of this census of decisions over a 10-year period
(2006–2016). The Appendix shows the number of cases studied
over time. We then analyze these data with our interview data to
study the influence of technocratic and socio-political approaches
to the external ‘‘demand” side of the RTIA and the ‘‘supply” or gov-
ernmental internal perspective. We then make observations about
how transparency reforms could be deepened in the RTIA imple-
mentation regime in India.
4. Findings
Similar to other countries in which drafting RTI legislation was
a long process, it took more than a decade and a half of political
maneuvering and several drafts of legislation before India’s Right
to Information Act (2005) was adopted (Banisar, 2006; Roy with
5
the MKSS Collective, 2018; Sharma, 2015; Singh, 2007, 2010). In
order to maintain the RTI movement momentum and to ensure
that amendments would not be introduced to weaken the legisla-
tion, with its meticulous institutional design, the RTIA was enacted
by the Indian Parliament in June 2005 and came into force in Octo-
ber of that year, just four months later.
4.1. External technocratic and socio-political approaches: citizen
activism and social accountability
The external or ‘demand side’ factors of the Indian RTIA illus-
trate that a robust movement that emerged 15 years before the
law was adopted contributed to the fastidious technocratic institu-
tional design of the legislation itself (Roy with the MKSS Collective,
2018; Singh, 2007, 2010; Sharma, 2015). Leaders in that movement
had deep knowledge of the socio-political and technocratic context
in which the historic legislation would be adopted because they
had been in the Indian Administrative Service or had family mem-
bers in government, been involved in law, or had political or media
links (Sharma, 2015). These connections helped minimize the risk
of a mismatch between the letter of the law and the reality on the
ground in the bureaucracy (supply side).
When the RTIA was adopted, a deep sense of exhilaration across
the country was reported upon widely by news media, which
became an integral part of the movement’s agenda (Relly &
Pakanati, 2018). Expectations were high that the new legislation
would create a revolutionary change away from the enduring Bri-
tish colonial legacy within the Indian bureaucracy that fostered
secrecy (Roberts, 2010), similar in opacity to many other socio-
political conditions in other countries with RTI-like legislation
(Camaj, 2016a, 2016b; Darch & Underwood, 2010; Grigorescu,
2002, 2003; Piotrowski et al., 2009; Roberts, 1998; Snell, 2001,
2006; Szekely, 2007). ‘‘It’s a huge act. I can’t even explain the kind
of transformation or the kind of help it has given, the empower-
ment it has given to people.” [11] Looking back, ‘‘You can’t even
imagine before 2005.” [10] Before, ‘‘getting information out of gov-
ernment departments, unless you knew someone personally, could
not be imagined. But now you have a right to go there and with just
that application form and 10 rupees [$0.14 U.S.], you can get that
information.” [13]
From the time of adoption forward, a major strategy among
activists, grassroots groups and civil society organizations (de-
6 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
mand side) was to request information about rights-based issues
from the government through the RTIA, often sharing their results
from these campaigns with media groups [104, 106, 111–114]. One
of these collective approaches included multiple waves of audits.3
National RTI leaders and others interacted with state and central
government officials about their findings and collaborated on recom-
mended changes. [104–107, 110–113, 143, 160, 162, 164–165, 171–
172] This intersection of external and internal factors, and socio-
political and technocratic approaches became emblematic of the
RTI landscape in a number of jurisdictions in India.
4.1.1. Internal socio-political barriers to openness
Though the RTI legislation would be the law of the land
throughout India, the central government and the states would
develop their own policies and rules. Scholarship has noted that
when institutional arrangements with transparency legislation
are not a great fit with political and bureaucratic cultures and
administrative noncompliance or adversarialism follows, declines
in enthusiasm around the reforms may lead to frustrated reques-
ters (Darch & Underwood, 2010; Roberts, 1998; Snell, 2001,
2006). Public sector workforce attitudes and ideologies about
information access that have been described as adversarial admin-
istrative behaviors include an ‘‘us-versus-them” mindset, unfriend-
liness, ‘‘sitting on requests,” processing delays, and information
denials that lack clear explanation (Darch & Underwood, 2010, p.
119; Roberts, 1998; Snell, 2001, p. 28; Szekely, 2007). In India, a
small earlier qualitative study with eight public officials found
there was a sense of ‘‘tension” and ‘‘anxiety” around the adminis-
tration of the law. These emotions accompanied anti-access strate-
gies designed to obfuscate and deny information requests, confuse
applicants, delay responses and even attempt to wrongly convince
requesters that the information requested was not covered under
the RTI law (Agrawal, 2012, p. 33; Snell, 2006; Pasquier &
Villeneuve, 2007). Many participants in our research echoed these
experiences. Research participants suggested that the legacy of the
Official Secrets Act left over from British rule still was a major bar-
rier to expanding a culture of openness in the Indian bureaucracy.
[8, 10, 16, 28, 30, 170] There was an overall sense from respon-
dents that many ‘‘bureaucrats have been conditioned to conceal
and not to reveal information. They are not accustomed to provid-
ing information freely.” [170] It was noted, ‘‘Some officials, they
still think that that everything should be covered up.” [16]
Another internal socio-political consideration cited by informa-
tion requesters and incongruent with the spirit of the RTIA was the
‘‘attitude of the bureaucracy.” [28] Study participants described
some Public Information Officers (PIOs), government agency
employees who are designated to receive RTIA applications and
decide upon information release within a 30-day period, as ‘‘stone-
walling,” ‘‘unfriendly,” ‘‘unhelpful,” ‘‘unprofessional,” ‘‘a major
impediment,” [9, 10, 12, 13] and ‘‘playing a game of words when
we ask for information.” [29] This data supports a government-
contracted assessment more than five years before we collected
data, which noted, ‘‘Governments and public authorities have
3
We identified journalists through a list of top 20 (for circulation number)
newspaper outlets in India (WAN-IFRA, 2015) and within those news outlets
identified journalists who were frequent RTIA requesters (through news and other
reports). For the social activist and civil society organization representatives list for
recruitment into the study, we accessed the only two publicly available lists: the
Working Committee of the National Campaign for the People’s Right to Information
(NCPRI), which includes organizational representatives and individuals throughout
the nation, and a highly visible list of national and local RTI civil-society organizations
and social activists who use the RTIA. The former list was the most active group that
had been involved with monitoring implementation throughout the life of the
legislation. The latter list was the most widely circulated nationwide public resource
contact list to offer support to citizens related to utilization of the RTIA.3 Right to
Information Assessment (2009), RTI Assessment & Advocacy Group (2014), Roberts
(2010), SNS & RaaG (2017).
taken inadequate steps to make the RTI process citizen-
friendly.”4 Moreover, at a 2018 convention of information commis-
sioners, an information commissioner for the western state of
Rajasthan stated that given the provisions of the RTIA, ‘‘it is assumed
that the PIO will behave in [a] friendly manner with the applicants
and provide necessary assistance, but this is rarely so.”5 According
to one Central Information Commissioner [177] in our study,
PIOs need . . . to be more sensitive when interacting with the
public, to provide information when the request is not properly
written yet they know what the requester wants and have the
information. Also, the PIOs can work with the public so that
the requests are in better form. . . . so that deliberate denial is
minimal.
As time progressed and the release of public information led to
exposure of corruption that was regularly reported in national and
local news, study participants (information requesters on the
‘demand-side’) indicated a trend toward denials of government
information access or limited information access. [11, 13, 16, 19,
20, 22, 24, 29, 30, 160, 161, 201, 206] ‘‘It’s about government
departments learning from their experience – how to deny infor-
mation.” [11] ‘‘There is an automatic fear in the minds of the offi-
cers . . . I think that is the basic instinct that all these officers have
developed. . . . They don’t want to be the person in charge and
responsible for opening a Pandora’s box.” [13] ‘‘If they give infor-
mation, it will not be the correct information, not complete . . .
They try to avoid questions, avoid problems.” [201] ‘‘When they
don’t give the records, they say . . . ‘We have a manpower shortage.
Computers are not working.’” [106]
Data has also become more difficult to obtain over the lifetime
of the RTIA. ‘‘For example, if you ask for the [total] number of
industries polluting, they will give you information about textile
industries or mineral industries.” [201] ‘‘They give us access to
piles of information which don’t contain the information we asked
for in the first place.” [29] ‘‘We have written stories about how
using RTI[A] is becoming difficult, how information is not being
given on time, how things are not going well.” [19] A grassroots
globally known leader in the RTI movement indicated that this
socio-political bureaucratic context is simply the backdrop for
institutional reform:
The RTI has actually enabled us to cross some insurmountable
barriers earlier, but there is massive resistance. . . . Eventually
it’s a battle in a change of culture. There was, and is, a prevailing
culture of secrecy that is trying to move toward a culture of
openness. That is a massive challenge that will take years, dec-
ades to change. [114]
4.1.2. Internal and external factors: Socio-political issues and outright
retaliation
Previous scholarship in Freedom of Information implementa-
tion has suggested there are conditions in public sector environ-
ments in which outright ‘‘malicious noncompliance” or ‘‘pre-
emptive destruction” may occur where records are shredded or
removed in an effort to obscure criminal activity or when major
political change is afoot (Darch & Underwood, 2010, p. 119;
Roberts, 1998, 2006; Snell, 2001, 2006). One study found that pub-
lic sector employees profiled RTI requesters who lacked identity
protection with serious implications in locales where government
and criminal activity intermingle (Michener et al., 2019). Our
4
PricewaterhouseCoopers (2009, p. 44)
5
Chowdhary, S. (2018, October 12). Implementation of Right to Information in
Letter and Spirit. Central Information Commission Annual Convention 2018. New
Delhi, India: Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances, & Pensions (p. 44).
http://cic.gov.in/sites/default/files/2017/ac/s18-0.pdf.
 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
research, too, found concerning activity around RTIA requests
noted by some study participants. ‘‘There were times when I was
threatened in a very indirect manner.” [19] After filing one RTIA
request, one journalist noted:
My roommate called me and told me there were people waiting
for me outside . . . People who were rogue looking . . . They
specifically asked for my full name . . . Even my roommate
doesn’t know my full name. Since I have given my full name
for this RTI, they came . . . in an official vehicle. [13]
Other requesters have faced violence or threats of violence in an
environment of impunity [19, 23, 30, 101–103, 126, 127, 138–142].
A respected transnational nongovernmental organization has doc-
umented 172 assaults, 184 incidents of information requesters
being harassed or threatened, and 86 deaths of information
requesters.6 ‘‘A contributing factor is corruption taking place . . .
They want to hide the information.” [30] Other participants in our
study mentioned knowledge of issues of occasional blackmail, that
is individuals outside government requesting compromising infor-
mation from government and then threatening bureaucrats or others
with going public unless the individual was compensated in some
way. [4, 106, 109, 127–130, 162, 163, 168] Some study participants
noted collusion between corrupt government officials and organized
crime groups, or ‘‘mafia.” A globally recognized leader in the RTI
movement and a longtime academic in public administration in
India, contextualized the issue this way:
When I started looking at files of corruption from the 1700s and
1800s in India, there were exactly the same issues. . . . These are
not just coming up or easy-to-solve issues. There is an ecology;
there are processes of an evolution. . .. Already I can tell you that
in the RTI world now all sorts of strategies are developed in the
bureaucracy to go around this. [106]
4.2. Proactive disclosure: a technocratic approach without socio-
political considerations?
International standards and trends for RTI legislation in the last
two decades have included ‘‘proactive disclosure” in the legislation
(Mendel, 2008). The technocratic provision obliges public authori-
ties to publish routinely released information, even when there is
not an information request. Generally, the scope of such disclo-
sures may vary from country to country, but they extend to how
an agency operates, its policies, public participation opportunities,
and information about how to request information (Mendel, 2008,
p. 5). Scholarship has noted the quantity of information provided
with proactive disclosure varies greatly (Dokeniya, 2013; Garcia-
Tabuyo, Sáez-Martín, & Caba-Pérez, 2016; Kim, 2008; Neuman &
Calland, 2007; Piotrowski, 2007; Piotrowski, Zhang, Lin & Yu,
2009; Roberts, 1998; Snell, 2001, 2006). We suggest the level of
internal e-government and records system development, both
technocratic aspects of access-to-information law implementation,
would be potential determinants of capacity to carry these provi-
sions out on a large scale.
In India, the RTI law requires the public sector to regularly dis-
close information to citizens through multiple means, including in-
person and the internet. The law calls for 17 categories of informa-
tion to be proactively available to the public, even when not
requested.7 Study participants noted, ‘‘Governments haven’t put all
6 13
Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (2020)
7
Department of Personnel & Training, n.d.; Devasher et al. (2018, pp. 13–14). Those
categories generally include information about organizational structure; procedures
followed for rules, regulations, decision-making and other norms; financial informa-
tion relating to projects of an organization; information about consulting arrange-
ments; and information about how to access information.
7
the information about their policies and schemes on their websites,
information which should have been in the public domain . . . after
such a huge number of RTI applications.” [31] Others pointed out
basic information such as job descriptions may not be available in
some government offices. [112, 113]
Audits of public information requests from the Indian govern-
ment have demonstrated again and again that many citizens use
the RTIA to obtain basic information that government is expected
to be supplying, such as information about food ration cards or
retirement pensions, or other potentially misappropriated entitle-
ments. Analyses published by a civil society organization noted a
majority (74%)8 of cases from a randomly selected sample of more
than 3800 RTIA applications filed in the country9 were ‘‘asking for
information that should have been made public without having to
file applications.”10 Study participants noted proactive disclosure
was common in the tech-oriented cities that are online with e-
governance, whereas proactive disclosure was at times more of a
struggle in some rural government offices operating without
computers.
In 2011, five major civil society organizations met with central
and state government officials through a taskforce set up through
the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions in the
Department of Personnel and Training, the agency charged with
overseeing the RTIA. The gathering was in response to concerns
about the proactive disclosure provision (Section 4), in part
because the law contained no mechanisms to enforce compli-
ance.11 Nearly six years after the legislation was adopted, the task-
force recommended guidelines for proactive government disclosure
on and offline, explored prescribing simple templates for disclosing
categories of information (at panchayat, district, and other levels),
as well as how to enforce proactive disclosure, and protect individu-
als who seek information under the RTIA. [104, 112, 113, 114, 171]12
By 2013, the central government had issued specific proactive dis-
closure guidelines, eight years after the law was adopted. A central
government implementation memorandum after the RTI community
input, stated that ‘‘disclosure should be done in the local language so
that it remains accessible to [the] public. It should be presented in a
form that is easily understood and if technical words are used, they
should be carefully explained. . . . Disclosure should be made in as
many mediums as feasible and disclosures should be kept up to
date.”13
By 2018, the central government conducted an audit of govern-
ment websites and created a system to reward (Web Ratna – ‘‘Gem
of a Website”) departments for designing and populating websites
in accordance with Section 4(1)(b) of the RTI Act. Of the 2092 pub-
lic authorities included in the audit, 40 percent responded and
were ranked. Nearly two-thirds (62 percent) received a ‘‘D” or
below on the category of ‘‘information disclosed on own initia-
tive.”14 A co-convener of the National Campaign for the People’s
Right to Information noted about the central government initiative,
8
Bari et al. (2015, p. 64). The random selection was of 3821 applications from nine-
states, one union territory and central government strata from a total of 14,000
records requests.
9
Bari et al. (2015, p. 52)
10
Bari et al. (2015, p. 52)
11
Government of India, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions,
Department of Personnel & Training. (2011, June 11). No. 1/6/2011, Task Force
constituted for effective implementation of Section 4 of the RTI Act 2005.
12
Government of India, p. 5. One task force government secretary from Andhra
Pradesh noted the state created 18 templates for categories of information to
proactively disclose.
Government of India, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions,
Department of Personnel & Training. (2013, April 15). No. 1/6/2011-IR, Implemen-
tation of suo motu disclosure under Section 4 of RTI Act, 2005 – Issue of guidelines.
14
Tiwari and Ansari (2018, November). Transparency audit of disclosures u/s 4 of
the Right to Information Act by the public authorities, p, 20. New Delhi: Central
Information Commission.
8 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
‘‘I think it was a one-time evaluation exercise. . . . Their report also
revealed the poor state of compliance. It is worse in the states.” [104]
4.3. The ‘demand’ and ‘supply’ side: outreach, education, and training
The strength of RTI-like legislation often has been associated
with the public ‘‘demand” side of the legislation testing the system
(Ackerman & Sandoval-Ballesteros, 2006). Moreover, from a tech-
nocratic perspective, evaluating training for government informa-
tion officers inside public organizations is a way to test the
strength of RTI law (Neuman & Calland, 2007; Piotrowski et al.,
2009). Though the government of India does not track the number
of state government information requests, only those made of the
central government, it has been estimated that between 4 million
and 6 million information requests are filed annually with state
and central government,15 a figure that surpasses other nations
with RTI legislation.16 Study participants suggested that public
awareness campaigns about the existence of the RTIA and training
on how to use the law had not been a top priority of the Indian gov-
ernment. Under the RTIA, government, offices may develop and orga-
nize educational programs to advance public understanding of the
rights noted in the law and how to use them, particularly targeting
disadvantaged communities, ‘‘to the extent of availability of financial
and other resources.”17 Civil society organizations have been train-
ing citizens and government employees around the country since
the RTIA was adopted, visiting villages in Right to Information cara-
vans, distributing RTI information at weddings and other events,
producing edgy videos in multiple languages that go viral, creating
YouTube PSAs, and partnering with news outlets to spread the infor-
mation access message.
In the early years of the RTIA the government Department of
Personnel and Training, which oversees the RTIA, entered an agree-
ment with the United Nations Development Program18 between
2004 and 2007 for RTIA implementation training. Between 2005
and 2008 public information officers and other stakeholders
throughout 24 districts in 12 states attended training workshops;
the government disseminated guides and manuals on how to use
the RTIA.19 In our study more than a decade later, a Central Informa-
tion Commissioner [175] noted, ‘‘PIOs still lack training. That’s a
challenge. It’s the nature of the PIO job to frequently change posts.
It is a challenge that the RTI regime faces. One third of the PIOs
are transferred each year and there are 20,000 PIOs in the central
government.” Another Central Information Commissioner noted that
public information officers and functionaries involved with the
office, which addresses first appeals of information request denials,
rarely have an ‘‘opportunity to attend regular RTI training courses
and mostly learn from precedence or trial and error.” [176]
Still, some states have launched RTI online training. For exam-
ple, the southern coastal state of Kerala has started an RTI online
15
Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (2018); Satark Nagrik (2018a).
16
Bari et al. (2015, p. 81); Bhardwaj and Johri (2017). A majority of RTIA requesters
are from urban areas – metropolitan areas, cities and towns (80%) with 20% from
villages, even when more than 60% of the country’s population is in villages. However,
national assessments (2005–2008, 2011–2013, and 2015–2016) through content
analysis of RTI applications, interviews, and other data, indicate a majority of the rural
sample of applications were below the poverty line, which many attributed to
outreach of civil society organizations.
17
Right to Information Act (2005, p. 19).
18
United Nations Development Program (2004). State Administrative Training
Institutes in Maharashtra, Kerala, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, and Odisha offered RTI
courses to officials. The Centre for Good Governance, Hyderabad, which is housed in
the premier administrative training institute of Government of Telangana & Andhra
Pradesh along with Yashwantrao Chavan Academy of Development Administration,
Pune (the premier administrative training institute of Government of Maharashtra)
were designated as the National Implementing Agencies to promote capacity building
activities for implementing RTI.
19
Centre for Good Governance (2005–2012) www.cgg.gov.in/publications.
course administered by the Institute of Management in Govern-
ment through the RTI Knowledge Portal. Leading civil society orga-
nizations, as well, including the National Campaign for the People’s
Right to Information, have stepped into the leadership and coordi-
nation void, training both government and citizens over the nearly
decade and a half since the law has been adopted.
4.4. Uneven (or inadequate) resource commitment and constrained
capacity with surging information demand: central and state
government RTIA implementation
Research on RTI around the world has shown that how these
laws are enacted and enforced vary from government to govern-
ment, office to office, and even within an office, which was a find-
ing in a report in India just five years after the law was adopted20
(Camaj, 2016a, 2016b; Darch & Underwood, 2010; Michener et al,
2018; Roberts, 2006). Political will, organizational culture and ideol-
ogy, and commitment of funds for training are a combination of
technocratic and socio-political influences.
A majority of study participants indicated that the central gov-
ernment was more resourced and more efficient and effective with
handling RTIA requests than state governments. Our fieldwork and
secondary data also indicate quality of responses to information
requesters is uneven in government offices from state to state.
[2, 5, 6, 10, 13, 14, 24, 25, 35, 110] Transparency ‘‘depends on the
state government, the department, and it also depends on the
information that you are asking for.” [25] According to one study
participant, for some ‘‘state authorities, . . . you feel like they didn’t
understand your question. . . . It is because of English (There are 22
official languages in the country). Also, people appointed are not
competent enough. They are not trained enough to answer. They
feel their obligation is not to share it, but they have to just answer
it anyway” [24] to comply with the law. ‘‘Sometimes they give you
an answer, and in that answer, you will have nothing related to the
question.” [2] In reviewing a limited number of responses to appli-
cations, we noted this as well. According to one state information
commissioner, ‘‘the quality of information provided is poor and
frequently responses to RTI applications are given in one word or
one sentence using technicalities and loopholes to avoid meaning-
ful or helpful answers.”21 This is consistent with findings more than
five years earlier in a government-contracted audit of RTIA imple-
mentation, which found that among information seekers who were
surveyed, 75 percent were dissatisfied with the quality of informa-
tion being provided.22
The amount of time it takes to obtain information under the
RTIA was a concern among many study participants, similar to a
number of other countries studied (Camaj, 2016a, 2016b; Kwoka,
2015; Roberts, 2002, 2005; Silver, 2016). ‘‘The biggest barrier is
their tendency to take a lot of time” [23], following the letter of
the law to notify in 30 days but only ‘‘on their terms,” noting the
government office has received the application. ‘‘Earlier access to
information used to be faster.” [30] As the number of RTI requests
have risen, so has the number of backlogged cases. Table 2 shows
the increase in requests and backlogs at the central government
level and the decline in the number of RTIA application rejections.
It is worth reiterating that, according to study participants, the sat-
isfaction with the information provided is low in many jurisdic-
tions with a few exceptions around the country and in high tech
cities. At the central government level alone, the number of infor-
mation requests have increased by more than seven times from the
first full year of the legislation (171, 398 requests in 2006–2007) to
2017–2018 (1.23 million requests), while the backlog of RTIA
20
PricewaterhouseCoopers (2009, p. 5)
21
Chowdhary (2018, p. 5).
22
PricewaterhouseCoopers (2009, p. 43).
 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088 9

Table 2
Central government RTIA requests, backlogs and rejected applications (2005–2018).

Year Number of RTIA requests Backlog of RTIA requests Number of information requests rejected Percentage of applications rejected /year
2005–06 24,436 0 3387 13.9
2006–07 171,398 12,026 15,388 9.0
2007–08 263,261 23,926 18,966 7.20
2008–09 329,728 32,792 23,954 7.26
2009–10 529,274 97,474 34,057 6.43
2010–11 417,955 137,771 21,413 5.10
2011–12 629,960 76,016 52,313 8.30
2012–13 811,350 75,331 62,231 7.70
2013–14 834,183 128,447 60,127 7.21
2014–15 755,247 89,785 63,351 8.39
2015–16 976,679 188,538 64,666 6.62
2016–17 915,749s 212,430 60,428 6.59
2017–18 1,233,207 215,466 63,206 4.0

Source: Central Information Commission (2018a).

requests has grown by nearly 18 times in that time span (Table 2).
The sheer volume of requests demonstrates, at the very least, the
persistence of public enthusiasm for information rights.
Study participants also stated that responses from their
requests often resulted in information in formats that were chal-
lenging to use, unusable, or too much work to compile. For exam-
ple, two study participants noted that they used to be able to
obtain aggregated state-level data in the western state of Gujarat,
but that has changed so each jurisdiction within Gujarat must be
queried separately. The process creates delays and results in disag-
gregated and often incomplete data when some jurisdictions do
not comply. [205, 206] Government officers indicated many public
records systems are not effectively managed. A Central Information
Commissioner [176] noted, ‘‘Everything is in shambles in most of
the [state] government offices. There are a few officers who are
well organized and do not have any difficulty . . . Other depart-
ments are yet to be developed.” More than five years prior to our
study, an audit found that 38 percent of public information officers
cited ineffective records management is the reason for delaying
information to requesters and nearly half (43 percent) did not
know about record management guidelines.23 A state information
commissioner pointed out a diverse body of experts indicated issues
with the RTIA regime, which include
poor record keeping and records management in government,
work overload in public-dealing departments and offices, lack
of infrastructure and [social capital] resources, administrative
apathy and non-cooperation, patroni[z]ing attitude of public
functionaries, drive for control through hoarding of information
by bureaucracy and fear of loss of power.24
In New Delhi, according to another Central Information Com-
missioner, ‘‘Our own study’s findings show that management, stor-
age and dissemination of records could be improved. . . . More
capacity building” is needed. [177]
4.5. Innovation: preference to digitization
When considering RTIA implementation in India, it is important
to keep in mind the diverse settings within which governments
operate. Some study participants noted the paradox of India being
a global tech giant yet having a low internet penetration rate (29.5
percent of total population),25 making it impossible for an online
portal to reach all citizens wanting to file an information request
under the RTIA. However, a small Central Information Commission
study demonstrated that online proactive disclosure would cut
information request caseloads by 20 percent; civil society organiza-
tion research indicated requests would drop by 40 percent. [175]
Some of the country’s local governance systems at the village
level (more than 248,901 Gram Panchayats)26 are limited on digital
access and do not have computers. [25] ‘‘That’s why we work with
some of the governments at the grassroots level to put information
out in other ways like wall paintings, like putting [records] out for
inspection with public officers.” [104] Nonetheless, numerous study
participants suggested that there is a need for digitizing records.
‘‘Most of the documents are in paper form.” [14]
Study participants indicated that government in the country’s
information technology hub areas seem to be leaders in providing
digitally efficient information access. ‘‘Karnataka [the state where
technology hub Bengaluru is located] is great.” [8] A journalist in
Pune, in the western state of Maharashtra that includes the finan-
cial and commercial city of Mumbai, noted that with state govern-
ment, ‘‘I have always gotten information I have sought, barring a
couple of cases” [19]
The Central Information Commission27 is considered a digital
leader in the country, as it provides more than 12,300 video confer-
ences a year to handle remote appeals hearings, specially tailored
software for appeals and complaints, and an online portal for appli-
cations and appeals with many options for payment. The central
government uses an e-portal for RTIA requests and for appeals made
to the First Appellate Authority (required to respond in 45 days) and
in second appeals to the Central Information Commission. ‘‘When it
comes to central government, I am very happy because I can simply
log in, type my application and also use my debit card for payment.”
[28] A Delhi-based academic activist noted, ‘‘It works very well . . .
Yesterday I did it and it took me two minutes, that’s it.” [106] ‘‘As
far as state governments are concerned, they are purposefully not
encouraging online applications. . . . So I have to write an application,
take a printout, get a postal order and then I have to go the post
office where a parking facility is not available.” [28]
As noted, some states do offer e-portals for filing requests. The
large states of Karnataka and Maharashtra have e-portals while the
lower-income states of Bihar and Odisha also are examples of inno-
vation. Bihar has provided a call center where citizens can make an
application by phone, and the state was among the first to put a
user-friendly online process in place. Odisha, too, takes online
applications and is known for its work with training public offi-
cials. The state of Rajasthan, the birthplace of the grassroots RTI
movement, has been at the forefront on implementation, in some
areas, and has a Jan Soochna (Public Information) portal.

23
PricewaterhouseCoopers (2009, p. 8).
24 26
Chowdhary (2018, p. 1). Ministry of Panchayati Raj (2017–2018, p. 6).
25 27
United Nations Development Program (2019). Central Information Commission. (2018b, p. 25).
10 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
4.6. Internal technocratic and sociopolitical approaches through the
information commissions
Though transparency from a socio-political perspective inside
government may even be considered more of an attitudinal than
legal ideal (García-Tabuyo, Sáez-Martín, & Caba-Pérez, 2016),
effectiveness of the implementation of RTI laws depends on the
nature and authority of the agency (Holsen & Pasquier, 2012;
Neuman & Calland, 2007). A dedicated agency such as a strong
information commission can play a pivotal role in successful
implementation (Hazell & Worthy, 2010), whereas in its absence,
often a result of poor political commitment, adherence may be
poor (Michener et al., 2018). The language in the Indian RTIA was
meticulous in detailing the qualifications and make-up of informa-
tion commissions, including the body’s size, background and com-
position of members. Central government and state commissions
have been established across India to receive appeals or complaints
from citizens who have not succeeded with obtaining information
after appealing to the First Appellate Authority at the state or cen-
tral government level. The information commissions, which are the
last stops before the courts, consist of a chief information officer
and up to 10 information commissioners, and are considered to
be ‘‘critical to the RTI regime” for they have the authority to require
Public Information Officers to provide information requested under
the law.28 However, Indian civil society organizations that assess
and report on the RTIA have concluded that state and central govern-
ment information commissions are ‘‘a major bottleneck in the effec-
tive implementation of the RTI law.”29
Of the 153 posts for information commissioners across the
country, most recent data indicates one in four was vacant.30
Nearly 90 percent (25 out of 28) of the information commissions
were headed by retired bureaucrats.31
Many of the information commissions across the country have
been kept dysfunctional. Most of the information commission-
ers appointed are ‘pliable’ retired government officials who
have spent their entire career hiding information from the pub-
lic domain and cannot be expected to bat for transparency in
their post-retirement career. [170]
Study participants from the Central Information Commission,
who meet once a year with state counterparts, indicated a major
challenge is not having its own trained and dedicated staff; the
Commission uses contract labor that changes every year. [175,
176, 177] According to one Central Information Commissioner
[176], understaffing and undertraining causes major inefficiency:
‘‘We are totally dependent on those outsourced employees. . . . In
some states, the governments do not appoint enough information
commissioners, a political decision. They should appoint, but they
don’t.”
We analyzed a random stratified sample of 500 Central Infor-
mation Commission orders from a 10-year period (2006–2016),
looking for documentation in the final orders that 1) stated the
original request for information and 2) recorded that the PIO
responded to the original RTI request, as these two data points
are considered critical. 32Three out of four orders, on average, con-
tained the original RTIA request and nearly two-thirds contained a
record that the PIO responded (See Table 3).
28
Holsen & Pasquier (2019); Satark Nagrik (2018a, p. 1).
29
(Satark Nagrik (2018a, p. 1).
30
Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (2018).
31
Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (2018, pp. 6-8).
32
Research Assessment (2017a, 2017b).
Secondary state level data shows that the time it would take for
an information request appeal to be decided upon in the states
across India ranged from 1 month to 43 years,33 which again
demonstrates the implementation and technocratic capacity differ-
ences, as well as socio-political bureaucratic differences, among
Indian states. Table 4 demonstrates the time it takes to process a
RTIA application in the central government system – from the orig-
inal request through an appeal and decision from the CIC.
At the central government level, the median waiting time more
than tripled in our study from a median wait of 171 days in 2006 to
589 days in 2016, with one case taking 2714 days (7.43 years).
Most of the delay from application to final appeal was at the Cen-
tral Information Commission, which by law does not have a time
limit on processing case decisions — a limitation in the institu-
tional design of the RTIA. Similar to our Central Information Com-
mission backlog findings, one cross-sectional analysis found there
is also an increase of backlogs at state information commissions.34
We also note that many of the Central Information Commission
orders analyzed in our research contained missing case information
related to dates at each step in the process of appeals, as noted in
Table 4, which supports civil society organization performance
reports that final orders are missing critical information.35 [112, 113]
The Central Information Commission does exhibit nationwide
leadership by organizing annual conferences with state informa-
tion commissioners to share ideas, issues, and innovations. Central
and state government information commissioners and civil society
organizations present on topics such as emerging trends, comput-
erization of records and record keeping, finding ‘‘un-reached citi-
zens to allow them to participate in governance,” and state-
specific case studies. All material is posted on the Central Informa-
tion Commission36 website.
4.6.1. Internal technocratic approaches: penalties and disciplinary
actions as incentives
Scholarship indicates RTI effectiveness and efficiency within
bureaucracies requires ‘‘incentives for action and disincentives
for inaction” (Neuman & Calland, 2007, p. 206). Penalties have been
utilized as incentives for complying with policies, though there is a
dearth of empirical research that finds penalties of different types
as effective (Gans-Morse et al., 2018, p. 175). One of the key tech-
nocratic ‘‘innovations” in the RTIA from a global perspective was
‘‘incentivizing” compliance with the legislation through penalties
‘‘to punish noncompliance.”37 The institutional design for informa-
tion commissions in India provides binding power for disciplinary
action and penalties for officers not complying with the RTIA. When
Public Information Officers withhold requested information without
legal standing under the RTIA or provide incomplete, incorrect or
misleading information, the law states that Information Commis-
sions can recommend disciplinary action or impose a penalty of
250 rupees ($3.61 U.S.) per day for each day up to 25,000 rupees
($360.81 U.S.).
However, our research found that only in four of the 500 ran-
domly selected cases (fewer than 1%), over a 10-year period, did
the Central Information Commission impose a penalty. The penal-
ties ranged from 10,000 rupees ($144.32 U.S.) to 25,000 rupees
($360.81 U.S.). Thus, though the penalties and disciplinary actions
33
Satark Nagrik (2018a, p. 24) In West Bengal, it was projected that it would take 43
years to dispose a case. This was calculated utilizing information commission case
backlog data and monthly disposal rate (time it would take for the complaint/appeal
if filed with the commission on April 1, 2019, to be disposed). The computation
followed the assumption that complaints and appeals were disposed in chronological
order.
34
Research Assessment (2017b, p. 50).
35
Research Assessment (2017a, 2017b); Satark Nagrik (2018b).
36
Central Information Commission (2018b).
37
Satark Nagrik (2018a, p. 35).
 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088 11

Table 3
Original RTIA request and PIO response to RTIA request recorded in final CIC orders.

Year Original RTIA Request Reported PIO Response to RTIA Request Recorded
Yes No Other Yes No Other
2006 100% – – 50% 25% 25%
(n = 4) (n = 2) (n = 1) (n = 1)
2007 61.5% 30.8% 7.7% 46.2% 53.8% –
(n = 8) (n = 4) (n = 1) (n = 6) (n = 7)
2008 81% 14.3% 4.8% 61.9% 38.1% –
(n = 17) (n = 3) (n = 1) (n = 13) (n = 8)
2009 71.4% 28.6% – 71.4% 28.6% –
(n = 30) (n = 12) (n = 30) (n = 12)
2010 74% 24% 2% 60% 40% –
(n = 37) (n = 12) (n = 1) (n = 30) (n = 20)
2011 77.2% 22.8% – 66.7% 29.8% 3.5%
(n = 44) (n = 13) (n = 38) (n = 17) (n = 2)
2012 65.2% 34.8% – 43.9% 53.0% 3%
(n = 43) (n = 23) (n = 29) (n = 35) (n = 2)
2013 68.9% 29.5% 1.6% 70.5% 27.9% 1.6%
(n = 42) (n = 18) (n = 1) (n = 43) (n = 17) (n = 1)
2014 72.5% 25.5% 2.0% 70.6% 25.5% 3.9%
(n = 37) (n = 13) (n = 1) (n = 36) (n = 13) (n = 2)
2015 80.0% 15.4% 4.6% 72.3% 27.7% –
(n = 52) (n = 10) (n = 3) (n = 47) (n = 18)
2016 75.7% 18.6% 5.7% 64.3% 34.3% 1.4%
(n = 53) (n = 13) (n = 4) (n = 45) (n = 24) (n = 1)
Total 73.4% 24.2% 2.4% 63.8% 34.4% 000
(n = 367) (n = 121) (n = 12) (n = 319) (n = 172) (n = 9)

Table 4
Median time taken to process RTIA requests and appeals.

Days Taken for the PIO to Respond Days Taken Between First Appeal Days for CIC to respond to Second Days from RTIA application to CIC
and FAA* decision Appeal Decision
Median/SD Range Cases Median/ Range Cases Median/SD Range Cases Median/SD Range Cases
(Missing) SD (Missing) (Missing) (Missing)
2006 42.00 7–77 n = 2 (n = 2) 38.00 – n = 1 (n = 3) 182.00 – n = 3 (n = 3) 171.00 79–327 n = 3 (n = 1)
(49.50) (00.00) (00.00) (125.37)
2007 31.00 7–43 n = 6 (n = 7) 42.00 19– n=3 119.00 65–233 n = 8 (n = 5) 235.50 61–401 n = 10
(13.08) (13.89) 44 (n = 10) (54.96) (103.08) (n = 3)
2008 28.00 7– n = 12 24.00 0–86 n=6 206.50 102– n = 10 462.00 235– n = 15
(121.41) 446 (n = 9) (29.44) (n = 15) (103.09) 437 (n = 11) (167.42) 789 (n = 6)
2009 43.00 6– n = 29 22.00 0–50 n = 13 77.00 48–523 n = 19 261.00 114– n = 40
(58.64) 241 (n = 13) (16.37) (n = 29) (118.06) (n = 23) (211.02) 1145 (n = 2)
2010 33.00 4– n = 26 35.50 10– n = 12 53.00 33–180 n = 19 233.50 120– n = 40
(42.66) 195 (n = 24) (14.82) 62 (n = 38) (35.51) (n = 31) (222.31) 911 (n = 10)
2011 25.50 4– n = 38 24.00 5–89 n = 19 115.50 9–365 n = 42 254.50 61–660 n = 48
(24.14) 120 (n = 19) (22.55) (n = 38) (89.26) (n = 15) (123.04) (n = 9)
2012 24.00 5–82 n = 29 33.00 0–58 n = 18 166.50 5–852 n = 32 320.00 81– n = 49
(13.84) (n = 37) (14.72) (n = 48) (229.32) (n = 34) (265.33) 1151 (n = 17)
2013 29.00 9– n = 43 32.50 0–71 n = 22 369.00 33–732 n = 29 460.50 62– n = 58
(30.74) 183 (n = 18) (15.86) (n = 39) (137.06) (n = 32) (245.19) 1649 (n = 3)
2014 30.00 6– n = 35 27.00 1–55 n = 27 432.00 220– n = 31 549.00 341– n = 45
(71.03) 436 (n = 16) (14.56) (n = 24) (250.01) 1527 (n = 20) (178.67) 971 (n = 6)
2015 27.00 2–63 n = 46 30 (9.43) 0–47 n = 38 361.00 38–798 n = 47 504.50 126– n = 60
(15.36) (n = 19) (n = 27) (164.06) (n = 18) (211.70) 1460 (n = 5)
2016 24.00 5–91 n = 43 29.00 2– n = 30 458.00 65– n = 59 589.00 178– n = 63
(17.18) (n = 27) (82.76) 479 (n = 40) (318.23) 1831 (n = 11) (466.60) 2714 (n = 7)

were considered forward-thinking in the institutional design of the we have given the information now so next time maybe you
RTIA, neither have been used by the Central Information Commis- will not do these types of things.’ The matter ends there. So
sion as expected. Some study participants suggested that in the these are the things whereby the public authority have learned
early days of the RTIA, the bureaucracy was more earnest in com- how to . . . what you call dodge this Right to Information. [160]
pliance for fear of penalty.
Then they realized nothing is going to happen and in some cases
5. Discussion and conclusion
. . . for them twenty-five thousand (rupees) [$360 U.S.] is noth-
ing because of corruption . . . that would bring in more than the
This exploratory study analyzed civil society and government
penalty. The disciplinary actions are more of a deterrent to
approaches to implementation of the globally recognized Indian
them because it goes into the annual confidential report . . .
RTIA. The research utilized a framework of technocratic and
Even then, they pardon the officers by saying, ‘That is okay,
socio-political factors on the bureaucracy ‘supply’ side and on the
12 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088
civil society and activist ‘demand’ side to study the context and
activity around the implementation of the law across the country.
The framework provides a window into the presence or absence of
key factors identified in the literature as ‘ideal-type’ conditions for
supplying, requesting, and utilizing information under the RTI law.
The mixed-methods study ultimately examined how the institu-
tion of the law has developed in India and potential divergences
that exist between the original institutional design of the RTIA
and how it operates in practice. It is important to note how RTI leg-
islation functions when embedded in different technocratic and
socio-political environments, for even when institutional designers
consider the long and short term when developing a piece of legis-
lation, interactive effects and ‘‘unanticipated consequences are
likely to be widespread” (Pierson, 2004, p. 115). We found this to
be the case in India, with information commission backlogs; heavy
turnover of public information officers; threats, assaults, and kill-
ings of RTIA requesters; blackmail; and harassment of information
officers with hundreds or thousands of requests, all being
addressed proactively by the RTI community (demand-side) and
to a lesser degree by the government (supply-side).
Before turning first to our analysis of the external and internal
factors examined in this study of RTIA implementation, we note
that history matters, as does the path of a country engaging with
the ideals of transparency and accountability. Moreover, we sug-
gest that the technocratic and socio-political framework utilized
in this study allows researchers to interrogate the intertwined rela-
tionships and underlying factors that may hamper or spur action or
institutional reform (Swidler, 1986). We inductively found three
major socio-political factors that impacted the implementation
trajectory of the Indian RTIA: political will, bureaucratic culture,
and societal activism and engagement. From the societal activism
and engagement perspective, we note much of the innovation
and dedicated auditing from the technocratic approach on the
external ‘demand-side’ has existed since the RTIA’s inception.
These ‘demand-side’ actors also regularly publish widely read
reports that highlight new issues and include recommendations
for improvement.
RTI societal engagement and citizen activism (‘demand-side’)
went well beyond continuing workshops and training the trainers
how to file information requests. RTI movement leaders and acti-
vists have consistently consulted with and collaborated with cen-
tral and state governments on developing RTI policies, rules,
templates and other tools for managing information. They promote
proactive disclosure, record making and archiving, monitoring, and
oversight, always keeping in mind the poorest in India and those
with different linguistic and other abilities. India has been a labo-
ratory for these monitoring tools, largely because of civil society
organizations and think tanks.
Again, on the external (public) factor side of the socio-political
analysis, we found civil society engagement and collaborations
among government sectors, politicians, networks of civil society
organizations and activists. Civil society groups also engaged with
large media houses on initiatives related to the implementation of
the RTIA and public utilization of the law. Civil society organiza-
tions’ steady persistence has led to mass public awareness of infor-
mation rights in India, support for information rights, and the truly
impressive utilization of the RTIA that appears to continue despite
obstacles.
Clearly, information requester communities are essential to RTI
regimes (Kim, 2008; Neuman & Calland, 2007), and citizen reques-
ters in India demonstrate robust enthusiasm. However, just as
demand for information is linked to legitimacy of an RTI regime
so are perceptions of the quality of information accessed (Kim,
2008). Concerns that requests for government data could decline
because the information received is not relevant, usable or high
quality adds to reports of public officials’ obfuscation and drawn
out response times, which are socio-political and technocratic fac-
tors associated with implementation. Our study found these issues
were playing out in some states and less so with the central
government.
Additionally, the study found some administrative behavior
that appeared to fit squarely within other scholarly work, often
socio-political responses to major institutional change shifts
(Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2007; Snell, 2001, 2006). An interesting
facet from our study was how public information officers some-
times find ways to stay within the lines of the law while effectively
not fulfilling information requests. Most of Pasquier and
Villeneuve’s (2007) explanations for public sector socio-political
resistance seemed quite apt: historical tradition; nature of institu-
tions being risk averse, inwardly focused, hierarchic, and security
concerned; and being unequipped to communicate and maintain
relations with the public beyond strictly administrative foci (p.
157).
On the internal (public sector) ‘supply’ side of our socio-political
framework, the study found some government administrators and
public information officers demonstrated motivation and accom-
plished milestones in what could be considered public interest
group work. Public sector administrators also partnered on tack-
ling RTI issues with others in government and civil society organi-
zations. Areas key to supporting RTI institutional development and
fueling a shift from a secrecy culture to a public interest imperative
are leadership and coordination, public communication, oversight,
reflexivity, and building a culture of risk-taking.
Shifting to the technocratic side of the framework from the gov-
ernment (supply-side), we note all of the internal factors were pre-
sent, but mitigated: some resources committed, some training,
some policies and rules, some innovation, some monitoring, mini-
mal oversight, occasional sanctions and policy enforcement. These
factors were unevenly distributed across government and not
nearly as robust as the institutional designers of the RTIA intended.
It appears training across the government did happen in the early
years of the RTIA; the frequent turnover and demands of frontline
public information officer work make it clear that training should
be rigorous, dynamic and continuous.
Though our study’s descriptive data may create an impression
of cultural inertia, adversarialism and administrative burden
within sectors of the Indian bureaucracy, the findings also
demonstrate leadership, coordination, and innovation. We found
that efficient and effective programs within the central and state
governments often involved actors who embraced ‘good gover-
nance’ ideals. Some individuals used these programs to build
trust related to political competition as Berliner (2017) sug-
gested; others moved up in government hierarchically in the
process.
It is important to note that ‘‘alarming levels of noncompliance”
with RTI-type legislation have been chronicled around the world
(Camaj, 2016a, p. 348; Cuillier, 2010; Darch & Underwood, 2010;
Darbishire & Carson, 2006; Michener et al., 2018; Roberts, 2006;
Snell, 2001). Oversight often is missing. Across India, Information
Commissions were technocratically designed to provide oversight,
though most were understaffed, largely focused on appeals, and
rarely enforced penalties or disciplinary action even when war-
ranted. Heavy caseloads and bureaucratic backlogs may contribute
to these shortcomings, so it may be, too, that adequately resourced,
fully staffed Information Commissions could lead on the socio-
political and technocratic areas of innovation, solutions-
orientation, education, training, and outreach. Those who created
the RTIA assumed that penalties and disciplinary actions written
into the statute would incentivize administrative compliance. How-
ever, our study demonstrates that compliance is weak. Other
 J.E. Relly et al. / World Development 136 (2020) 105088 13

research has demonstrated insufficient evidence that penalties actu- Conflicts of interest
ally work for anti-corruption type policies (Gans-Morse et al., 2018).
Scholarship also indicates that adequate compensation serves No conflicts of interest.
as a performance incentive (Kim, 2008) and pay raises, promotions,
bonuses, awards and certificates have been noted as potential tools CRediT authorship contribution statement
for innovation or high performance in RTI regimes (Neuman &
Calland, 2007, p. 207). However, one comprehensive interdisci- Jeannine E. Relly: Conceptualization, Methodology, Project
plinary study indicated there was insufficient evidence that administration, Investigation, Data curation, Formal analysis, Vali-
pay-for-performance worked with anti-corruption policies dation, Visualization, Writing - original draft, Writing - review &
(Gans-Morse et al., 2018). Nonetheless, Piotrowski (2007) pro- editing, Funding acquisition, Resources. Md. Fazle Rabbi: Concep-
duced a compelling U.S. study that could serve as a strong argu- tualization, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing.
ment for elevating and professionalizing the work of information Meghna Sabharwal: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing,
access professionals. We acknowledge, however, that the resource Visualization. Rajdeep Pakanati: Methodology, Investigation, Data
demands of effective and efficient RTI law implementation and a curation, Validation, Project administration, Funding acquisition,
socio-political culture that values openness requires political com- Writing - review & editing. Ethan H. Schwalbe: Project administra-
mitment because the costs are not minimal (Neuman & Calland, tion, Investigation, Data curation, Validation.
2007), particularly in nations with emerging economies with many
pressing and urgent needs. Acknowledgements
Finally, as has been noted in earlier work unrelated to RTI,
research on socio-political, or cultural change, can be oversimpli- The authors thank the editor of World Development and the two
fied or overgeneralized in a way that implies ‘‘values engineering” manuscript reviewers for very helpful insights and input on the
would be desirable or approachable (Noordegraaf & Vermeulen, manuscript. The authors also acknowledge Manish Poptani for his
2010, p. 517). That is not what we are suggesting. However, work as an interpreter and translator and his transcription work.
through the exercise of studying bureaucratic practices and deliv- We also thank Shazia Salam for audio transcription. Jeannine E Relly
ery of information to citizens over time and the various processes received funding for the research from the United States–India Edu-
of the RTI regime, this line of research can highlight important gaps cational Foundation, Fulbright Commission in India. The researchers
(Calland & Bentley, 2013) that provide opportunities for innovative also received funding for transcription and fieldwork from O.P. Jin-
solutions, such as India’s use of e-request portals, call centers tak- dal Global University in India under the Research Grants Policy.
ing information requests, and providing important government
information in wall drawings.
Appendix. Random stratified sample of Central Information
This study has limitations. RTI-like regimes change. Though this
Commission RTIA decisions
study largely focused on more than a decade of RTIA implementa-
tion, it does not contain ethnographic data, which would further
provide granular insights. In addition, our purposive sample of
Year Cases Percentage Sample
information requesters were sophisticated users of the RTIA, which
impacts our findings. Moreover, each government office, section of 2006 1349 0.71 4
the country, and citizen requester are different, presenting myriad 2007 4883 2.56 13
challenges, opportunities, motivations, incentives and risk 2008 7974 4.19 21
(Pierson, 2004). Thus, innovations or policies that may not work 2009 15,981 8.39 42
in one institutional case may thrive in another (p. 163). Future 2010 18,974 9.96 50
research could focus upon purposive ethnographic or experimental 2011 21,794 11.44 57
studies of public information officer work related to RTIA regimes 2012 24,993 13.12 66
in India at the central and state government levels. Replication of 2013 23,116 12.14 61
civil society organization research also would contribute to the 2014 19,610 10.3 51
breadth of understanding in the literature of how a large democ- 2015 24,913 13.08 65
racy with a wide-range of constituencies manages an RTIA regime. 2016 26,875 14.11 70*
This study found that the RTIA regime in India is a sprawling Totals 190,462 100 500
and dynamic system that includes crucial active and vigilant civil
society organization leadership and a social activist constituency *Rounded down.
with some public sector and political interest group support. These
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Jeannine E. Relly is a professor in the School of Journalism with a courtesy
appointment with the School of Government and Public Policy at The University of
Arizona. She was a Fulbright Scholar in India (2016-2017). Her interdisciplinary
research focuses on government information policy, access to information legisla-
tion and disinformation as it relates to democratic governance, social movements
and collective action associated with information rights and freedom of expression.
She has studied the influence of access-to-information legislation on democratic
governance in more than a dozen cross-national studies and case studies.
Md. Fazle Rabbi is a doctoral student in the School of Economic, Political and Policy
Sciences at The University of Texas at Dallas. His area of research encompasses
public sector reform, governance, and public policy. He is particularly interested in
accountability, participation and responsiveness aspects of governance. His previ-
ous research includes, along with others, responsiveness and accountability of local
government and community participation in public-private partnership.
Meghna Sabharwal is a professor in the School of Economic, Political and Policy
Sciences at The University of Texas at Dallas. Her research interests are focused on
public human resources management, specifically workforce diversity, job perfor-
mance, job satisfaction, and high-skilled migration. She is widely published in
public administration journals. She has two book publications: Public Personnel
Administration (6th ed.) and Public Administration in South Asia: India, Bangladesh, and
Pakistan.
Rajdeep Pakanati is an associate professor at the Jindal School of International
Affairs, O.P. Jindal Global University, India. He earned his doctorate degree from the
University of Delaware (U.S.). He has been engaged with issues of transparency and
accountability, and how they contribute to good governance. His dissertation
examined the processes through which freedom of information legislation was
adopted in India, South Africa and the United Kingdom in a comparative context. It
is to be published by Oxford University Press, India, as a book.
Ethan Schwalbe received a BS in mathematics from The University of Texas at
Austin and a MS in Foreign Service from Georgetown University. He participated as
a research associate on this project. Prior to focusing on research and other work in
Tucson, Arizona, he oversaw external engagement for the American Chamber of
Commerce in Japan for several years.