A New Right to Information Bill
Will we finally get what we deserve?

- Charmaine Rodrigues & Mandakini Devasher
RTI Team, CHRI

On 23 December 2004, the United People’s Alliance (UPA) Government in India finally tabled a new Right to Information Bill 2004 (“RTI Bill”) in Parliament. When passed, the RTI Bill will replace the Freedom of Information Act 2002 (“FOI Act”) which was passed more than 2 years ago but was never implemented.

The right to information has been recognised for decades by the Supreme Court of India as a fundamental right of every Indian under Article 19 (Right to Freedom of Speech and expression) and Article 21 (Right to Life) of the Constitution. In practice, this right recognises that every person in India has a guaranteed right to access information held by government departments information which explains what they do, how they do it and how much it costs. Information is not a gift graciously given by Government. It is collected on our behalf with our money and we should be able to access it as of right.

Currently, much of the Government's information is kept secret, particularly if it might lead to exposing of corruption. A properly drafted and effectively implemented Right to Information Act can be used by the public to ensure that the Government will no longer be able to dodge our questions. If civil society is active in using the right to information to scrutinise the Government it could serve to change the very nature of governance in India as we know it by finally forcing public officials to be answerable to us, the public.

The FOI Act passed in 2002 was poorly drafted. As such, it was hoped that the new RTI Bill would offer the country a new opportunity to effectively implement our fundamental right to information. While considerably improved, the new Bill still contains a number of drawbacks, which need to be fixed before the Bill is passed.

It is in all of our interests to make sure that the very best Bill possible is passed by Parliament – and passed quickly. A good law will give us a powerful tool, which we can use to hold government officials to account. This is long overdue.

Background to the Development of the RTI Bill

The campaign for a comprehensive right to information regime celebrated its ten-year anniversary at the second National Right to Information Convention held in Delhi in October 2004. The campaign, which started as a grassroots movement in Rajasthan, has grown to encompass activists from all over the country. Over the years, it has notched up many successes. Most notably, nine states in India have already passed Right to Information laws – namely, Tamil Nadu, Goa, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Delhi, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Assam and Jammu Kashmir.

Unfortunately, at the national level, progress has been much slower. Although the FOI Act was passed in 2002, it was very weak, failing to conform to well-accepted international standards. In any case, although the FOI Act was published in the Official Gazette in 2003, the Government never notified a date for it to come into operation. It has thus remained a paper tiger.

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