RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT IN INDIAN DEMOCRACY

“…democracy requires an informed citizenry and transparency of information which
are vital to its functioning and also to contain corruption and to hold Governments and
their instrumentalities accountable to the governed.” RTI Act 2005.

INTRODUCTION

In order to promote transparency and accountability in administration, the Indian Parliament enacted The Right to Information Act which came into force on 12 October 2005. The law empowers Indian citizens to seek information from a Public Authority, thus making the Government and its functionaries more accountable and responsible. The Act has now been in operation for over three years and has benefited many, including the poor and the underprivileged. It is a matter of pride that we have given to ourselves, a tool which has the potential to usher in transparency, and reduce corruption. At the International level, Right to Information and its aspects find articulation as a human right in most important basic human rights documents, namely, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Unlike many other countries which took several years to operationalize the Act post the enactment, India took only a few months to bring it into force. Though this has resulted in a few discrepancies in the implementation of the act, the role played by the act in empowering the Indian citizens is laudable.

NEED FOR THE ACT

Democracy requires an informed citizenry and transparency of information which are vital to its functioning. India despite being an emerging economy is marked by great disparities in the allocation of rights and amenities to the citizens. The disadvantaged groups often continue to remain in the clutches of injustices and inefficiencies of the democracy. The most saddening part of the Indian democratic set up is that the benefits of the government programmes often do not accrue to the poorer sections of the society as also the tax payers.

This situation has essentially necessitated the enactment of the Right to Information Act in 2005. The act has been aimed at empowering the citizens, promoting transparency and accountability in the working of the government. A major objective of the act is containing corruption and making the democracy work for the people in the real sense. Informed citizenry will be well equipped to keep necessary vigil on the instruments of government and make the government accountable to the governed.

WORKING OF THE ACT

The Right to Information Act, 2005 is applicable in all the states of India excepting Jammu and Kashmir by Article 370 of the constitution. By the provisions of the act, a citizen of India can claim information regarding the working of any of the public authorities in India. Thus it is applicable to executive, legislature and judiciary, any institution or body established or constituted by an act of the Parliament or State Legislature, bodies or authorities established or constituted by order or notification of government including bodies owned, controlled or financed by the government.

The information dispatched may be in the form of records, documents, memos, emails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models or data materials held in any physical or electronic forms. All citizens of India can seek information under the act.

Each Public Authority has a Public Information Officer and Assistant Public Information Officers with whom the appeals are to be made. If the information is to be forwarded to another department 5 days time is to be provided.

The fee for filing the application is Rs. 10. Additional charges of Rs 2 per page of information and Rs 5 for each hour after the first hour is charged. For the Below Poverty Line people the entire procedure requires no payment of fees, they only need to provide the BPL certificate.

Exemptions:

There are certain organizations which are exempted from the procedure of Right to Information Act. They are:
• Intelligence Bureau
• Research and Analysis Wing
• Directorate of Revenue Intelligence
• Central Economic Intelligence Bureau
• Directorate of Enforcement
• Narcotics Control Bureau
• Aviation Research Centre
• Special Frontier Force
• Border Security Force
• Central Reserve Police Force
• Indo- Tibetan Border police
• Central Industrial Security Force
• National Securities Guard
• Assam Rifles
• Shastra Seema Bal
• Special Branch (CID) (Andaman and Nicobar Islands)
• Crime Branch CID (Dadra and Nagar Haveli)
• Special Police Guard
• Defense Research and Development Organisation
• Border Road Development Board
• Financial Institutional Unit

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE?

The first appellate authority of the Right to Information Act is the Chief Public Information Officer and the second appellate authority is the Chief Information Officer for the various ministries. Followed by these are the Information officers at the centre, the State Information Officers, Public Information Officers for the Public Authorities and Assistant Public Information Officers under the PIOs.

The CIC is appointed by the Prime Minister, one Cabinet Minister nominated by the Prime Minister and the Leader of Opposition. The SIC is appointed by the Chief Minister nominated by the Chief Minister and the Leader of Opposition in the state.

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

If the authorities concerned fail to disseminate the required information in the stipulated time period, the appellant can lodge a complaint against the Information Officer. There is the provision for penalizing the slippery PIOs in the act if they move against the interest of the citizen. Rs. 250 per day till the application is received or information is furnished subject to the condition that the total amount of penalty shall not exceed Rs. 25000 is the fine imposed.

ACHIEVEMENTS

The Right to Information Act despite being in its infant stage has been able to reap success. The act has provided a tool in the hands of the people to successfully implement the tenets of democracy. The citizens have been empowered and the government made responsible through the implementation of the act. Even the disadvantaged sections of the community are finding a space in the democracy of India with coming of this act. The success stories range from highlighting scams worth crores to ensuring attendance of the sweepers in cities to identifying lost postal orders. The areas of corruption or inefficiencies were known earlier in the Government, but citizens could not take recourse. Issues related to malpractices in the PDS, delayed pension payments, house allotments, passports, activities of land mafias, corruption in the conduct of international events, corruption in the construction sector etc. have been unveiled by the act. In particular, the RTI Act has a much higher impact on the quality of life of the poor and marginalised section of the society. Another golden feather in the crown of RTI has been opening up the corruptions behind the much lauded Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme.

For the effective implementation of the recommendations of the act support from various agents is necessary, a few of which are listed below:

Civil Society Organizations
• Civil Society Organizations and social activists are enhancing the reach and awareness of RTI among the masses by lending support to generate awareness among the village people about RTI and empowering them. However, given the geographical size and population, the reach of Civil Society Organizations and social activists is limited.

Media
• Media has played an important role in generating awareness at a mass scale, particularly, through news articles based on RTI investigation. In the context of RTI implementation, journalists often play a dual role – as the users of RTI Act and as watchdogs, monitoring and scrutinizing the implementation of the Act.

Central Government
• The basic institutional structure or processes has been set up as per the RTI act requirement. Department of Personnel & Training has been made the Nodal Department for the RTI implementation at the Central level. A centrally-sponsored scheme for capacity building and awareness generation for effective implementation of the RTI Act has also been commissioned in the 11th five year plan.




PROBLEMS RELATED TO RTI

RTI has become a weapon in the hands of common citizens to fight for their rights. It is not surprising that the usage of RTI has been in the areas where citizens had to struggle to get what was rightfully theirs. RTI touches the life of a common villager and profoundly the Act has the power to help the common people in the areas where they felt a non-responsive attitude of the Government officials. But it cannot be ignored that there are a number of problems associated with the Act, especially at the implementation level. These can be broadly classified as the Demand Side factors and the Supply Side factors.

Demand Side:
On the demand side are the low levels of awareness and low quality of awareness. In spite of the efforts put in by the media, NGOs and the Government departments more needs to be done to generate awareness among the common man of the nation. This is quintessential because any policy benefitting the aam aadmi can only be considered as nation wide programmes.

Supply Side:
As on the supply side proper guidelines and awareness is not generated among the officials associated with the act. The lack of training results in delayed dispatch of the information and also the information being stuck in the ties of red tape. Thus, an act aimed at removing the ill of corruption becomes yet another platform for the in surge of corruption. To find relief from this challenge, behavioural training is the need of the hour. The dictum ‘justice delayed is justice denied’ once again finds importance.

Adjudicatory Problems (Information Commission):
The non-availability of User Guides for RTI implementation for information seekers is a major drawback of the act. Moreover, standard forms for RTI application are not available in the system. Coupled with this are the inconvenient submission channels for RTI application and inconvenient payment channels for submission of application fees: Lack of assistance in filing the application in addition to the non-friendly attitude of the Public Information Officers breeds more complex problems. Use of information technology in documentation is also not mobilized.

DISTURBING TRENDS


Apart from these difficulties, poor quality of information provided is yet another menace. More than 75% of the citizens are dissatisfied with the quality of information being provided.. The percentage of people who said that incomplete information was provided to them was alarmingly high in Andhra Pradesh – 91% and Uttar Pradesh - 96%.A study by the Magsaysay Award winner Arvind Kejriwal reveal that only 22% of the appellants get the required information. A survey conducted by the Public Cause Research Foundation (PCRF) shows that out of the 68% orders disclosed only 38% of them could be implemented.

Yet another menace facing the Right to Information Act is the massive killings of the RTI activists. The situation is so alarming that in 2010 alone there have been eight reported killings of the activists of which Maharashtra tops the list with four reported cases followed by Gujarat with two. Though investigation has been ordered and FIRs have been filed, the culprits have not been brought behind the bars. “The matter is under investigation. We will find the culprits” is the monotonous response of the officials.

SUGGESTED REMEDIES

The major problem is the lack of spread and quality of awareness. Hence, generating awareness among the citizens must be the core agenda in the Right to Information Act. It must be ensured that trained personnel are made available for educating the masses on the horizon provided by the act. Also there must be sufficient allocation of funds to meet this end. Special target groups should be the poor and marginalized and also the rural women.

Another area where the government needs to focus is proper training must be made available to the officials regarding the dissemination of information to the public. The information should be dispatched at appropriate time and it need to be accurate also. The public authorities must be encouraged to actively participate in the development and organization of such programs. Excellent trainers and training material must be made available for the same.

Moreover, a special committee must be formed for the selection of PIOs. The consultation or screening committee should consist of eminent personalities from various walks of life with a commendable service record. This recommendation is made in indication of the important role played by the Information Officers as also the priority attached to the Right to Information Act in the transparent and efficient functioning of the Indian Democracy.

There is an urgent need for the compilation of a user guide for the public in respective official languages. This will ensure the dissemination of the procedure of the act to the citizens and generate a foolproof mechanism for exercising the right to information, thereby ensuring the implementation of the act in a more effective manner.

The contact details of the PIOs and other officers concerned must be made available to the citizens. This will also facilitate efficiency in the conduct of the act. This is a citizen friendly approach to the conduct of the act.

Computerization of the records of the Public Authorities should be made mandatory for the smoother dispatch of information. This will save the time of both the appellant and the officer. Moreover the effort of the officers will also be made easier.

There must be a mechanism to ensure that the information is not just brought before the citizen, but also action is taken against the corrupt practices of the identified categories. This can only ensure transparency in the democratic set up.

Mechanism must be made for ensuring the security of RTI activists because threats to the life of citizens will result in their refrain form exercising the Right to Information. As a relief to the activists immediate action must be sought with regard to the pending cases, that is, the culprits must be arrested.

Please remember RTI is only one of the many potent tools for demanding implementation of laws or rules, for challenging established ways of doing things, for unleashing societal forces for change, for altering administration’s perception and behavior on issues. India’s transformation from elective democracy to participatory democracy has been facilitated and ensured by the RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT.