JAMIA MILLIA ISLAMIA
Faculty of law
Administrative Law
Transparency and accountability of the administration after the coming of Right to Information
Act, 2005 – An analysis
Submitted to: Bhavna Sharma
Submitted by: Sahitya Srivastava
BA.LLB (Regular) 6th Semester
Batch: 2017 - 2022
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to express my deepest gratitude to all those who provided
me with the possibility to complete this assignment. A special thanks to
my teacher, Ms. Bhavna Sharma, whose contribution in providing
suggestions and encouragement, helped me coordinate this assignment.
Furthermore, I would also like to acknowledge with much appreciation
the crucial role of the staff of Jamia Millia Islamia, who gave me the
permission to use all the necessary equipment and the required
materials to complete this assignment.
A special thanks goes to my classmates and friends who helped me
assemble the parts and gave their valuable suggestions.
Sahitya Srivastava!
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. INTRODUCTION
2. HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF RTI
3. THE RIGHT To INFORMATION ACT, 2005
4. DEVELOPMENTS AFTER THE IMPLEMENTATION OF
THE ACT
5. AN ANALYSIS OF THE ACT AND ITS IMPACTS
6. CONCLUSION
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LIST OF CASES REFERRED:
1. Mr. Subhash Chandra Agrawal vs. Department Of Justice
2. Bennett Coleman and co. vs. Union of India
3. State of UP vs. Raj Narain
4. SP Gupta & others vs. The President of India & others
5. Subramanian Swamy vs A.Raja
6. Swiss Timing Limited v. Organising Committee, Commonwealth Games
2010
7. Cen.Pub.Information ... vs Subhash Chandra Agarwal
8. Mr.Anil Bairwal vs Parliment Of India
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Introduction:
The process of democratic governance is most legitimate when it incorporates core
principles of democracy viz. transparency, pluralism, equal representation, accountability,
etc. These ideals constitute founding pillars for democratic governance and play an
indispensible role.
Transparency is a custom which bounds government institutions, to perform their
institutional and other supporting organizational activities in an open way without holding
any secrets behind, in order so that the public can levy its trust on these organizations
believing them to be fair & honest. In other words, it’s a practice of removing maximum
barriers and enabling information to be accessed by the public to facilitate procedures,
rules and regulations in order to protect citizens and thus, reflecting on the development
pace of the nation.
Accountability signifies the concern and duty of government, institutional workers for
performance of their duties for the best interests of the public and imposes responsibility
on institutional officials for their activities performed. The mechanism through which
government officials are held responsible for activities done against stated principles and
rules is called legal accountability. All of the following depend upon the accountability of
governments for fair and accessible application of the law and respect for international
human-rights standards:
Free and fair political and justice systems
Protection of human rights
Vibrant civil society
Public confidence in the police and the courts
Security Sector Reform
Democracy thus, requires these principles as ingredients, with legislature executing a major
role as regulator. It is presumed that parliament and its supporting organizations are the
appropriate zones to eliminate political allegations, corruption activities and
maladministration made. While, the civil society, the media, and the private sector, are also
expected to play a vital role and responsibility in bringing out such practices taking place
within the government for the greater benefit of the citizens.
The citizens start to lose their confidence in a government if it fails to deliver these rights.
Countries with high levels of corruption, lacking effective rule of law, accountability and
with opacity in administration & governance are more susceptible to conflict and social
unrest. The persistence of corruption adversely impacts the delivery of social benefits, and
is a contributing factor to the persistence of poverty and other inequalities.
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Therefore, a country's ability to sustain democratic reforms and to provide for the well-
being of its citizens depends on the extent to which a government is able to carry out these
functions effectively.
With reference to India, Right to Information happens to be the need of hour. Human security,
shelter, food, environment and employment opportunity are all bound up with right to
information. In the absence of information on these issues, people cannot live a dignified life and
will remain ever marginalized group in the society. It happens to be a powerful instrument to
protect the fundamental rights of people, as India is not formed by a single minded and
economically equal society on the contrary is a combination of a populace with a diverse
historical, cultural, religious and economical background.
Further, the constitution of India also states Fundamental Rights for its citizens, which are
irrevocable. Stating the need & relevance of Right to Information in India, P.N. Bhagwati, J
stated1:
“…..it is obvious from the constitution that we have adopted a democratic form of government.
Where a society has chosen to accept democracy as its creedal faith, it is elementary that they
ought to know what their government is doing. The citizens have a right to decide by whom and
by what rules they shall be governed and they are entitled to call on those who govern on their
behalf to account for there conduct.”
1
Mr. Subhash Chandra Agrawal vs. Department Of Justice (2014)
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Historical evolution of RTI
Information Rights in the international front have had a long history of around 246 years.
The need to disseminate information was hugely felt and hence, the first ever RTI law was
enacted by Sweden in 17662, the law in Sweden established press freedom and those at
stake were the government, courts, and parliament and the striking feature was that under
its ambit came the power held by the King.
Anders Chydenius (1729-1803) a Finnish enlightenment thinker and politician played a
crucial role in creation of this new law, and gave the world an insight into the benefits of a
transparent democracy.
Followed by it was French Constitution which in 1789 in its Declaration of Human and
Civic Rights under Article 14 stated that: "All citizens have the right to ascertain, by
themselves, or through their representatives, the need for a public tax, to consent to it
freely, to watch over its use, and to determine its proportion, basis, collection and
duration.3” Though this couldn’t be taken as a direct assertion of right to access
information but was a hint of a "right to know" for French citizen as to where their taxes
are being spent.
Post, World War II the UNGA in a first was the first to pass a resolution regarding
Freedom to Information in 1946, which stated freedom of Information as a fundamental
right and the touchstone of all the freedoms to which the United Nations had pledged.
Freedom of Information implied the right of gathering transmitting and publishing news
anywhere and everywhere without any fetters as such.4
In 1948, the milestone in human rights history was set up and named as, “Universal
Declaration on Human Rights which was drafted by a diverse body with representatives of
different countries & culture. UDHR expressly mentioned in article 19,"Everyone shall
have the Right to Freedom of expression which shall include freedom to: seek, receive and
impart information; regardless of frontiers - orally, in writing, or in print."5
Following all these developments, the United States enacted Freedom of Information law
in 1966, which was further enhanced after the Watergate scandal. Similarly, several
western democracies also enacted there laws making administration more transparent.
Further, The World Bank’s document of 1992 on Governance and Development also
identified accountability, transparency and information as integral aspects of the
seven specific aspects of 'good governance'6.
2
https://sweden.se/society/20-milestones-of-swedish-press-freedom/#
3
https://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/sites/default/files/as/root/bank_mm/anglais/cst2.pdf
4
http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/freedom-of-expression/freedom-of-
information/browse/1/
5
https://www.ohchr.org/en/udhr/documents/udhr_translations/eng.pdf
6
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In India:
Interestingly, in India, it was not so much the birth of democracy but its subsequent
failures, as a representative democracy, that gave birth and impetus to the transparency
regime, which was further enhanced with the idea of make democracy more participative
and inclusive.
Initially, in post independence India sporadic demands rose for transparency in
government. These demands gained strength around specific events like occurrences of
Disasters, major accidents, or when there were police actions like baton charge, firing on
public, or use of tear gas, there would be public furor over them which would lead to
demands like, making findings of enquiry committee’s set up public or full transparency in
their enquiries. These demands would be raised both, on streets and in the assemblies &
Parliament through public representatives, which slowly abated with time,
All this continued until the populace of this country was shocked by few unfortunate
events which shook their very confidence in the government and its working. The defeat in
the Indo-China war of 1962, the catastrophic performance by the Indian army and cession
of a large chunk of Indian Territory to China was the first event which people saw with
their eyes wide open. It was the first instance when demands of accountability of
government were seriously acknowledged.
While all this was happening in the mid-90s, and the executive in governance were using
the colonial weapon of secrecy, the official Secrets Act 1923, for defeating the rightful
claims of the governed, the judiciary was constantly destroying this weapon in favor of an
open, democratic and welfare form of governance.7
In the case of Bennett Coleman and co. vs. Union of India 8, the majority opinion of the
Supreme Court had then given “Freedom of speech and expression includes within it
compass the right of all citizens to read and be informed.”
A major breakthrough in this regard was achieved when the Hon’ble Supreme Court, in the
case “State of UP vs. Raj Narain” 9, where it ruled that: “In a government of
responsibility like ours where the agents of the public must be responsible for their
conduct there can be but a few secrets. The people of this country have a right to know
every public act, everything that is done in a public way by their public functionaries. They
are entitled to know the particulars of every public transaction in all its bearings.” This
decision of the court further, led to Imposition of emergency in the country.
http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/604951468739447676/pdf/multi-page.pdf
7
Sudesh Vasudeva, The Role of Judiciary in the Creation of a "Right To Information" in India,International
Conference on Trends in Economics, Humanities and Management(2014) 1
8
1973 AIR 106, 1973 SCR (2) 757
9
1975, SCR (3) 333
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Further, in the case of SP Gupta & others vs. The President of India & others 10 ruled
that, “The concept of an open Government is the direct emanation from the right to know
which seems implicit in the right of free speech and expression guaranteed under Article
19(1) (a). Therefore, disclosures of information in regard to the functioning of
Government must be the rule, and secrecy an exception justified only where the strictest
requirement of public interest so demands. The approach of the Court must be to attenuate
the area of secrecy as much as possible consistently with the requirement of public
interest, bearing in mind all the time that disclosure also serves an important aspect of
public interest.”
In 1985, the disastrous Bhopal gas tragedy shook the consciousness of the nation, and
questions were raised on the conduct, intention and actions of the government at every step
from giving illegal bypasses to Union carbide while setting up the plant, in its functioning
to the absconding of the fugitive Warren Anderson, and there was no mechanism to cross
check these classified information.
Freedom of Information Act, 2002:
The issues fermenting in the society took a face of movement in the last decade of the 20 th
century and the face of it became Human rights activists, environmentalists and individuals
fighting for their basic rights. These were accompanied in parallel by lawyers, journalists,
professionals and other learned persons of the society.
The first movement was initiated by the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) in this
regard which was working for the rights of landless labors and small farmers who were
denied their just benefits under the government scheme. This movement was first of its
kind which sparked revolution at grassroots levels and spread not only in the state of of
Rajasthan but in the whole country and became a backbone of all the movements being led
by intellectuals, academicians and organizations.
This movement in 1996 gave birth to a nationwide campaign named as National Campaign
for People’s Right to Information (NCPRI). The NCPRI drafted a right to information law
which after some modifications by the press trust of India was sent to government.
The Consumer Education and Research Council (CERC) in 1993, had proposed a draft RTI
law based on a nationalized idea; following which, Justice P. B. Sawant who headed the
Press Council of India and had drafted a model law on the same to the Government of
India in 1996, he updated it and renamed it as PCI-NIRD Freedom of Information Bill
1997 but for some reasons it could not be tabled in the Parliament.
Meanwhile, the government had again appointed a committee in 1997 headed by H.D.
Shourie for preparing draft legislation called as “Freedom of Information bill1997”. This
10
1982, AIR (SC) 149, p. 234).
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bill was also not enacted but in pursuance of its agenda the NDA government, after much
enquiry and discussion again introduced the Freedom of Information Bill, 2000 and going
through much discussion and debate it was finally passed in 2002 by Parliament and
received assent of President in 2003.
Interestingly, the act had a provision that it would come into effect only after being
notified, but it was never notified and hence never became effective.
While all this was happening few states without waiting for a central legislation had
already taken the lead by passing similar acts the first one among them being, Tamil Nadu
(1997) which was followed by Goa (1997), Karnataka (2000),Delhi (2001), and
Assam(2002).
Right to Information Act, 2005:
After the 2004 general elections the new UPA government led by Congress brought out a
“common minimum programme” which among other promises, promised “…..to make the
Right to Information Act “more progressive, participatory and meaningful” and formed a
National Advisory Council for its implementation. The NAC also had people from NCPRI
as its members. Besides, the change in government was also perceived as a chance for
getting a better FoIA.
In the meantime, through a public interest litigation filed in 2002 through Advocate
Prashant Bhushan, NCPRI & Centre for public interest litigation, trying to compel the
Government to notify an effective law to provide Indians with access to information. The
case was being heard by Supreme Court & in its order the court set a deadline of 15
September 2004 for the Central Government to advise when the Act will be notified and if
unable to notify, at least notify the dates when interim Administrative Guidelines would be
issued. Perceiving it as a chance for a stronger FoIA, the NCPRI started intense
campaigning and lobbying, all of this paid off when the incumbent government agreed to
bring a fresh RTI bill.
A fresh bill was introduced in the winter session of 2004, the bill though was a great
improvement from the previous FoIA 2002 bill but had some critical clauses from the
NCPRI & NAC amended, also it was only applicable to central government which would
make it irrelevant for the rural and urban poor, who were primarily relying on state
governments resources.
Amidst sharp criticism the bill was withdrawn and again new recommendations were made
and most of the provisions that had been deleted were restituted, including applicability to
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states. The Right to Information Bill, with amendments, was passed by both houses of the
Parliament in the summer session, got presidential assent in June and was finally notified
in October 2005.
In short, till 2005 in India the citizens had no effective mechanism to access to any
information which was dealt by a Public Authority and matters effecting public interest
were not easy for a common man to get access to. Without getting relevant information it
was difficult for a citizen to participate in any social, political or economical debate
concerning the issues or interest of the country and with the enactment of the Right to
information act,2005 we to a large extent coverd that otherwise blocked information.
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Right To Information act, 200511:
The Right to Information Act 2005 contains thirty one sections, six chapters and two
schedules.
Chapter One: Of the act in section 1 &2 contains preliminary information about the act
including definition.
Chapter two: Extending from section 3 to section 11 of the act and defines process of
acquiring information, obligations and restricted information in the act.
Chapter three: Of the act extending from section 12 to section 14 describes the
constitution of the Central information Commission by the central level, its powers,
nomination, tenure, salaries & allowances of the Chief Information Commissioner.
Chapter four: Of the act extends from section 15 to 17 and talks about the establishment
of the office of the state information commission.
Chapter five: Contains powers, functions of the information commissioner; section 18 to
20.
Chapter six: extending from section 21 to 27 contains miscellaneous clauses
Features of Right to Information and working process:
The RTI process involves duty to disclosure of information by the authorities whenever
asked to do. Information may be in mode or form viz. record, document, mails, press
release, contracts, or sample of electronic data among others. The act under its ambit also
includes inspection of work, documents, record or its certified copy and information in
form of disks, tapes, video, cassettes in any electronic mode or stored information in
computers etc. Each public and partially public authority has to mandatorily appoint a
Public Information officer (PIO) and Assistant Public Information officer (APIO) to serve
information to public. Any individual may submit a written request/application to the PIO
in order to seek any information. The PIO is responsible to provide the information on the
applicant request within the required time frame.
Applicants along with the written request/application, needs to submit a prescribed fee of
Rs.10. But for the people belonging to below Poverty Line (BPL) SC and ST categories are
exempted from the fee also. There is no prescribed format for filing an RTI application but
the application should mandatorily include signature of the application along with
applicants name and address, nature of required information and name and position of PIO.
If PIO fails to dispose the RTI application within the stipulated time limit, the applicant has
the right to file first appeal to first appellate authority in the same public authority.
The first appellate authority is responsible to provide information within 30 days under the
11
Right to Information act 2005
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section 19(1) of the RTI Act, but it is at the discretion of the applicant. If the first appellate
authority also fails to provide the required information within prescribed time limit,
applicant can file a second appeal to Information Commission against the PIO.
Information Commission is a quasi judicial authority under the act. The commission
conduct power to enquiry is at par to a civil court. If the information is not provided within
the prescribed time frame, the commissioner has the right to impose penalty Rs. 250.00 per
day but it cannot exceed more than Rs.25, 000. The RTI act constitutes two tier
Commissions one at Centre and another in States.
Right to Information act exempts the following organizations:
Twenty five government organizations are exempted from the purview under the second
chapter of the RTI act. These include intelligence agencies, central economic intelligence
bureau etc, research bodies working within the country, security agencies are also immune
to the law, so are the paramilitary forces.
The Directorate of Enforcement, Narcotics control board, Special Service Bureau, Special
branch of the Police in Andaman and Nicobar, Lakshadweep and Dadra Nagar Haveli are
also excluded from RTI act. These organizations however are required to provide
information if the panel believes the query raised by the appellant relates to a case of
corruption or abuse of human rights.
THE RIGHT TO INFORMATION (AMENDAMENT) ACT 2019
The 2019 amendment of the act made some significant changes in the act and replaced the
tenure of the CIC & SCIC from a fixed period of 5 years or the age of 65 to, the term as
prescribed by the central government.
It also made amendments to the salaries and allowances as enjoyed by the CIC & SCIC
would be as prescribed by the respective governments but not to the disadvantage of the
office bearer.
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Impact of RTI, 2005, an Analysis:
While the historical right to information act 2005 was passed, speaking in the house about
the role of accessible information in the representative democracy as of ours, and the need
of the the rigt to information act 2005, Dr. Manmohan Singh, the then Prime Minister of
India, bringing to light India's first significant step towards anti-corruption – The Right To
Information Bill ,said:
"The passage of the Bill will see the dawn of a new era in our processes of governance, an
era of performance and efficiency, benefits of growth will flow to all sections of the
society, eliminate the scourge of corruption, and will bring the common man's concern to
the heart of all processes of governance and fulfill the hopes of the founding fathers of our
Republic12."
The need of such an act was being felt since long amongst the awakened sections of the
society as they knew it will be major tool in curbing the ill-wills of the one’s in power, help
in identifying loose threads of the democratic setup and will make the government and
executives accountable.
Since, the enactment of RTI in 2005, it has emerged as a favorite tool of activists, lawyers
and whistle-blowers to unearth many anomalies and prevailing discrepancies in the
administration. Using it whistle- blowers have exposed many cases of high level corruption
in executive and legislature. It has controlled red tapeism in government offices to a great
extent. Some major impacts created by the RTI act are:
Accountability and performance of the Government:
The RTI has been a boon in disguise to people, with this mechanism to access information,
every public authority is now required to provide reasons for its administrative or quasi-
judicial decisions which even slightly harms even the last person of the society. Prior to the
implementation of the RTI Act, an ordinary person was never a part of active decision
making or even of discussion on it. An ordinary man could never think of getting over
government officers attitude of lingering tasks. The some of the biggest anomalies
discovered using the RTI are:
Indian Red Cross Society Scam: Barely two months after RTI came into force, Hitender
Jain, through his NGO Resurgent India, filed an application about the ways the funds
allocated by the government for the Kargil war Widows and victims of antural disasters
was being used.
12
https://archivepmo.nic.in/drmanmohansingh/speech-details.php?nodeid=118
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Twenty-six applications revealed that the IAS officers had siphoned off relief and
rehabilitation funds worth millions of rupees to buy cars, expensive mobile phones,
furniture, air conditioners, refrigerator, and pay for petrol, telephone bills, mobile phone
bills, hotel and ant bills, crockery, furnishings, LPG cylinder refills, and nappies.
Of the deviated funds more than five million rupees meant for Kargil War Relief, Orissa
Cyclone Relief and Gujarat Earthquake Relief have been deposited in P.M. Relief Fund.
The act worked as a "game changer," which changed the equation between the officials and
the public.
Demonetisation announced without RBI nod: Demonetization was declared in the country
by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 8, 2016, without any proper planning and
after holding a meeting that barely lasted for three hours, with just the core body of the
Reserve Bank Of India (RBI). The PM did not even wait for the formal approval to be
given by the Reserve bank before making an announcement that affected thousands of lives
in the days and months to come. An RTI filed by activist Venkatesh Nayak revealed that
the RBI had not agreed with the Centre on its justification that the move would curb the
circulation of black money and counterfeit money.
Promotion of partnership between citizens& Government in decision making process:
The RTI Act provided a statutory framework for promotion of citizen government
partnership in carrying out the programmes for welfare of the people. The partnership is
derived from the fact that people are not only the ultimate beneficiaries of development
and also the agents of development. Further, this partnership is the soul of a democratic
form of government.
Improved, critically analyzed projects accompanying dynamic development in every field
are the direct results of a stakeholder’s participation. Under the RTI act, citizen’s
participation has been promoted by giving them unrestricted access to information and
improving involvement of affected groups in designing and implementation of projects.
Empowering local government bodies for strengthening rural economy at village level
through the involvement and cooperation of NGO’s and self help groups.
Information could now be obtained under RTI, regarding utilization of funds allocated
under rural employment guarantee scheme. Most of all the welfare projects, at different
level, are being designed and developed in co-operation and support with the NGO’s or
affected persons, with a view to raising the satisfaction level of people.
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Reduction of prevailing corruption in the Government departments:
Corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain. It is generally Comprises
illegal activities, which mainly come to light only through scandals, Investigations or
prosecutions.
The absence of transparency and accountability encouraged the government officials to
corruption practices. This often resulted in totally different picture at ground level when
juxtaposed to the original idea which was being flouted in papers, files and executive
statements. This difference owed its occurrence to the prevailing red-tapeism, misuse of
power and authority. This diversion of funds was made to fill the pockets of different
people sitting at different hierarchies from bottom to top. This was afterwards used for
private purposes. This created an environment of distrust where the people were suspicious
of the government, which was a severe blow upon the principles of democratic governance.
The enactment of the RTI blew away this suspicion as it started promoting larger public
participation in making of policies, delivering of the services and administrative decisions.
It initiated appropriate programmes so as to achieve Government objectives. The Service
efficiency is manifested when there are effective provisions of services to the public, office
holders are responsive to public, where public opinion matters and so on. The act was
instrumental in unearthing scams.
The Aadarsh Co-operative housing society scam where a 31-storey building, which came
up in the prime real estate area of Colaba, Mumbai, was originally supposed to be a six-
storey structure to house war widows and heroes of the 1999 Kargil War. An RTI filed by
activists an unholy nexus between politicians, bureaucrats and military officials through
which they had flouted rules to acquire flats below market rates, which culminated in the
resignation of Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan.
The RTI applications sent by the activists to several public bodies revealed that the land on
which the building was constructed did not belonged to the government of Maharashtra,
but to the Ministry of the Defence under the central government. It also revealed that while
the allottees grew from 31 to 103 from 2003 to 2008, an environmental clearance was
never received to construct the high-rise in a Coastal Regulation Zone. The most
significant take away from the Adarsh Scam as it was the first such discovery was that it
“exposed the modus operandi of corruption.”
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The 2G spectrum allocation scam13 aka India's telecom scandal clinched the second spot in
Time Magazine's "Top 10 Abuses of Power" list, bested only by Watergate.
The 2G scandal involved the Telecom Ministry, led by Andimuthu Raja, undercharging
mobile phone companies for frequency allocation licenses, allegedly for bribes, which
ended up costing the Indian government Rs1,76,645 crore.
Another revelation came, when RTI activist Vivek Garg received close to 600 documents
in response to his application to the PMO, which included a controversial finance ministry
note that said 2G spectrum could have been auctioned at better prices had the then Finance
Minister P Chidambaram insisted.
The commonwealth game scam14 where dubious dealings of Suresh Kalmadi came to
forefront when just a week ahead of the athletes moving into their accommodation at the
CWG village, foreign observers found filthy rooms with piles of rubble and dust, dirty
sheets with paw prints, betel leaf (paan) stains on the walls, no electricity and plumbing,
and human waste on the bathroom floor and sink.
CWG emerged as an incubator of corrupt deals when Kalmadi was arrested for allegedly
handing out an inflated contract of Rs. 141-crore to Swiss Timing for its timing and
scoring equipment, which caused a loss of Rs. 95 crores to the Indian government
Another RTI revealed that the Delhi government had diverted Rs744 crore from social
welfare projects for the Dalits to the Commonwealth Games from 2005-2006 to 2010-
2011.
Judiciary:
Though the act since its inception has been accepted by a major sector of society but has
also faced a strong resistance from including various offices under the act, it ranged from
the military offices to the judiciary and the political parties but in recent times the view of
judiciary has changed and in the year 2010 Delhi high court while bringing the office of
the CJI under the ambit of RTI stated, “….. The CJI’s office was under the ambit of the
RTI. Independence of the judiciary was not a privilege but a responsibility cast upon the
office….” The decision was challenged in the apex court; a bench led by CJI Ranjan Gogoi
validated the judgement. Justice, D.Y.Chandrachud stated, “principal consideration for the
judges should be public interest……. and that judges are not above the law…..it is the duty
of the information officer to weigh claims made before deciding…..” 15
13
Subramanian Swamy vs A.Raja
14
Swiss Timing Limited v. Organising Committee, Commonwealth Games 2010
15
Cen.Pub.Information ... vs Subhash Chandra Agarwal
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Political Parties16:
While, on the funding of political party, there has been a long demand to include them
under the act, in order to audit their income and expenses but it has been denied
categorically by them. There have been strong reasons in support and against the claims,
like:
i. Political parties are not public authorities as they are not set up under the
Constitution or any law enacted by Parliament – they can’t be treated as an institution
or establishment.
ii. Political parties were not established by the constitution or an act of parliament and
therefore should not be under the RTI.
iii. They are formed under Representation of People Act, which is not the same as being
created by the parliament.
iv. Information about a political body is already in the public domain on the website of
the Election Commission.
While, the claims supporting their inclusion in RTI state17:
i. Under Section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 all political parties
must affirm their allegiance to the Constitution of India and such allegiance is made
compulsory for the purpose of registration under sub-section (7) of Section 29A.
Therefore, political parties so registered must furnish information to the public under
the right of information under Article 19(1) (a) of the Constitution of India, since
right of information has been held to be a part of freedom of speech and expression
under Article 19(1)(a).
ii. The Law Commission of India in its 170th Report on ‘Reform of the Electoral Laws’
in May 1999 had recommended transparency in the functioning of political parties.
iii. To ensure less influence of industrial houses on policy making: Most of the parties
have almost 75% of their income from unknown sources. Generally corporate and
industrial houses give them funds to change policies, give illegal clearance and to
hamper their competitor’s interest. It may also hamper people and national interest.
16
Mr.Anil Bairwal vs Parliment Of India
17
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxuc52olok4&feature=youtu.be
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Amidst all this, the major use of RTI has slowly gained focus on digging corruptions in
India, the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) which is provided by the Transparency
International, helps analyze the level of corruption in India and along with the position of
other countries. The CPI report ranks countries based on administrative transparency.
These rankings are based on how corrupt their public sector is perceived to be. The report
of 2019 ranked India at 43rd number on this list of 180 countries and it has been a
significant jump from the previous numbers.
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Conclusion:
The RTI Act has been used an effective instrument to promote transparency and
accountability in administration. It has opened whole new aspects for the citizens so as to
make the authorities more accountable. In its journey of more than 15 years the act has
been pivotal in digging the governments’ misdeeds, but then also there are some serious
questions which need to be addressed and leftover portions to be covered . Like, record
keeping practices within bureaucracy which are in deplorable conditions. There is an
unending problem of missing files etc.
Besides these infrastructural issues there have been some serious issues which have held
back the whole idea behind the participative governance.
First one being, harassment and murder of RTI applicants across the length & breadth of
the country for their proactive role in exposing nexuses, though the list goes long but to
name some of them are Shashidhar Mishra who exposed sale of contaminated water by
government contractors to the railways; Lalit Kumar Mehta who Exposed illegal fund
allocation under NREGA scheme; Datta Patil: Exposed bogus registration of cooperative
societies. These are some of the names of the list which runs in hundreds and the intresting
fact about it being that government has no record of these deaths
Another being, the increasing amount of frivolous questions being asked using the RTI,
About 75% of RTI queries are personal in nature which are more or less a burden on the
already overworked officers and a breach of privacy of the office bearers. This all is
contrary to what was imagined when the act was passed by Parliament in 2005.
Further, the applicants and majority of PIO’s lack of awareness and competencies required
to use of RTI in right manner. As a result the government programs, public utility services
and Public distribution systems have not reached all the public. As a result the
disadvantaged groups often find themselves on the receiving end of corrupt practices,
inefficiency and nepotism by the government.
At last, the act though has ended the administrations tryst with the autonomy and privilege
they enjoyed and brought them to books as responsible government authorities, but then
also it has a long track to cover as a tool for the strengthening the citizens which will be
possible by creating awareness about the Right to Information in rural areas so that more
rural people could practice their right and inclusion of some supplementary laws like,
Whistle-blower protection Act to protect RTI activists from attacks and life threats. These
changes to a great extent will cover up the flaws and loops of the act and be another step
towards the realization of the act in its truest sense.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books referred:
Rajeev Dhavan (ed.): Litigation Explosion in India, N.M. Tripathi, Bombay.
Dr. U. P. D. Kesari: Administrative Law, Central Law Publication¸ Allahabad.
The right to information act,2005
The right to information (Amendment) act,2019
Websites referred:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxuc52olok4&feature=youtu.be
https://archivepmo.nic.in/drmanmohansingh/speech-details.php?nodeid=118
https://sweden.se/society/20-milestones-of-swedish-press-freedom/#
https://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/sites/default/files/as/root/bank_mm/anglais/cst2.pdf
http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/freedom-of-
expression/freedom-of-information/browse/1/
https://www.ohchr.org/en/udhr/documents/udhr_translations/eng.pdf
https://archivepmo.nic.in/drmanmohansingh/speech-details.php?nodeid=118
http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/604951468739447676/pdf/multi-page.pdf
Research papers referred:
Sudesh Vasudeva, The Role of Judiciary in the Creation of a "Right To
Information" in India,International Conference on Trends in Economics,
Humanities and Management(2014)
The big Picture documents by Rajya Sabha TV
The Parliament Debates Archives
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