India is the largest democracy in the world and we feel proud of it. But without some powers in the hand of people, I don’t think democracy means a lot. Right To Information Act (RTI), 2005 was one of the most powerful tools in the hand of every single citizen of India. It did what was much needed for democracy always. It made public offices accountable and increased transparency.
RTI has helped uncovered many scams and corruption in government offices. It has helped people from a very small village to activists in a metro city.
Suvarna Bhagyawant, a woman from a small village named Ambhegaon got her grandfather’s death certificate within eight days after filing an RTI. Before filing the RTI she was asked to pay a bribe of Rs. 500 for the same certificate and had to make several rounds of offices.
The Adarsh Housing Scam in Mumbai which involved a six-story building originally meant for war widows and Heroes of the Kargil war was uncovered after filing an RTI. It exposed corruption and involvement of ‘big’ names.
Now, the act is going to lose its essence as the Right To Information (Amendment) Bill, 2019 has been passed in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha and only needs the signature of the President to become a law. What is this amendment in the bill which has caused such uproar among activists and lawyers?
According to the RTI Act, every single citizen of this country has the right to get information from any public office (including Prime Minister’s Office) or any office funded by the government’s money (exceptions excluded) about their structure and functioning. It ensures transparency even when the public officer doesn’t want it. It empowers us to examine and question the government’s decisions and assess if they are in the interest of the public.
But what if some department doesn’t want to give the information that we seek? This happens in most cases when departments don’t want to share information because it can expose corruption. There comes the role of the Information Commissioner (IC) and Chief Information Commissioner (CIC). If any public department refuses to give information that we seek then we can appeal to the IC and CIC who can impose a fine on the Officer who refused to give information. Fine can vary from Rs. 250 per day to 25000.
The IC and CIC can order any department to provide information failing which, the department is fined and can face other legal processes. To ensure work without any political pressure, these Information officers and the Chief Information Officer were kept free of any interfere from the government in RTI Bill, 2005. Their terms were fixed and their salaries were fixed. No one in power could have fired them or cut/stop/decide their salary. This certainly gave them the freedom to work honestly without any fear and that is (in the freedom of IC and CIC) where the soul of whole RTI act lies.
RTI(Amendment) Bill, 2019 I feel is killing this very soul by removing the fix tenure and salary of these officers. This recent bill proposes that the salary and tenure of IC and CIC will be decided by the central government which clearly indicates intervention in their working. You can imagine how honestly someone can work especially when it comes to giving an order against the interests of someone deciding his salary and tenure.
I strongly feel that the government has no solid arguments in favour of RTI (Amendment) Bill, 2019. It is to be noted that the current government has been embarrassed many times because of RTI. Through RTI, the petitioner was able to challenge claims around the prime minister’s educational qualifications. Another RTI uncovered happenings related to demonetisation-related claims made by the ruling dispensation.
RTI activists and lawyers have been asking tough but necessary questions to the government since the law has been made. It has uncovered numerous lies during Congress as well as BJP governments. A lot of RTI petitions are still pending and many haven’t answered by authorities even after orders of CIC. I am sure that this amendment will only discourage RTI activists and will make lead to a loss of transparency in government institutions. Does this government fear transparency? This is something that every citizen of this country must fear.
Though many activists and lawyers are protesting against this amendment and urging the president to not sign the bill, I strongly feel there is hardly any possibility of this happening and that the president will most likely sign the bill soon.
If the bill becomes law (which is most likely possible), RTI will mean hardly anything when it will come to uncover irregularities in the government offices. There will be a less likely possibility that an IC or CIC will now order the PMO to provide information that the office might want to hide. Now the IC or CIC will be like caged parrots which will sing according to the government, or at least will not sing against the will of the government.
We all must remember that ‘democracy’ alone means nothing without rights and right laws that empower ordinary people against powerful governments. One such law is being diluted and others can be in line.