Kr Swarn Kishore Singh
Few months ago, when I filed a RTI application before a highly placed officer in district administration seeking some information, the officer bluntly denied to provide me the information on the ground that he was not convinced enough to conclude whether or not I belong to the State of J&K. As my address on the application was that of my Delhi residence, he denied to entertain the application solely on the ground that the applicant is not a resident of J&K. Fair enough, but when I assured him on being a subject of J&K, he came up with another hilarious excuse. He said that since I had made the payment in the form of a banker’s cheque and they do not have a bank account, they don’t accept cheques as a mode of payment. In a way he was telling me that the callousness on his part is good enough to bypass the provisions of the legislation. In that context I must say that when Mr Modi is opening bank accounts of 99% of Indian household, why is he leaving these shady offices? Anyway, then I acquainted him with Rule 3 of J&K Right to Information rules 2012, which has given the applicants, freedom of making a payment by any of the three methods i.e. Postal order, demand draft & banker’s cheque. Even then the reluctance was so high on his part that he threw away the application and forced my office guy out of his office. Although then I got the application received by his senior official but what I noticed was a strange fear that engulfs the government offices whenever a guy approaches them with a RTI application. A RTI application simply means that the applicant seeks some information from the particular office. There is nothing horrifying in the application itself unless there is something that has been swept under the carpet.
Right to information is one of the highly celebrated rights for the subjects of a State by which the Government and its agencies are accountable to its citizens. The Government has to give information to the citizens about the way their monies are being spent. Ironically, when I went to research about the international history of right to information, it was a matter of grave anguish for me that even countries like Armenia and Azerbaijan had been giving this privilege to its subjects much before India started it effectively. A lot of other so-called third world countries were giving this privilege of freedom of information to their people that too when we Indians might not have had even dreamt of such an empowering statute. Even our dismal neighbour Pakistan was having this law much before us. Almost one hundred countries in the world are having legislations regarding freedom of information with Sweden topping the list by having this legislation which dates back to 1766. United States of America is having this law under the name of Freedom of Information Act which is effective since 1967 and England is having it under the name of Freedom of information Act, 2000.
In India, freedom of information was a new concept, when it was introduced by the then NDA Government under Atal Bihari Vajpayee via Freedom of information Act 2002, but not before Supreme Court recognized right to information as a right inherent to fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression guaranteed under Art 19 of Constitution of India. Then in 2005, the UPA Government after putting the old wine in new bottle and after making certain minute changes brought this legislation with a fresh nomenclature; Right to Information Act, 2005. Although even for this I can’t take the credit away from UPA, because like POTA they could have had easily shelved this legislation but they did not. Ironically the activism of their fugleman Rahul Gandhi and his persistent dithyramb proved destructive for his party and the same legislation helped in unearthing a lot of scams and hence effectuating the downfall of Congress.
This legislation is something which swept away the unbridled power which the executive were enjoying and misusing recklessly. It was a legislation framed to secure access to information under the control of public authorities, so as to promote transparency and accountability in the way the public money is being utilised.
The days of buttering the bureaucrats are over as the rampant discretion of the Government officials has being reined in by virtue of this revolutionary law. This law is a sort of weapon in the hands of the general masses to defend themselves from the hostilities of the bureaucracy and sometimes the government itself. This legislation has set the highest standards of accountability and the then Government should be congratulated for showcasing this model of progressive politics. So UPA and Dr. Manmohan Singh should be appreciated in that case and especially Rahul Gandhi for propagating this right so vigorously among the masses. Otherwise more often than not all the politicos enter into a secret connivance for not allowing something like that which will affect them all equally adversely. For example, on the issue of bringing political parties under the ambit of RTI, all the parties start ranting in unison for not allowing such a suicidal thing which will put an end to the manner in which they blackmail the business class. Even the money spent on Supreme Court judges was bestowed with immunity from this legislation by Delhi High Court.
This right is the most empowering legislation after the drafting of constitution of India. Constitution of India gave powers to the institutions and this legislation acts as a watchdog to put a check on misuse of the powers vested in them by the constitution. The old phrase, Ceaser’s wife must be above suspicion has been put to rest and now everyone is subject to audit barring some confidential matters. The law which acquaint the public masses about the manner any public authority is working should be obviously subject to public scrutiny and thereby public audit.
Although there is still a lot of room for improvement in our piece of legislation but we should not live in Jottenheim to expect a perfect and ideal system so early. Infact there is a trivia for the panglossians; we are having a better legislation when compared with the one of England. Their law gives their officials far more powers to deny the information than ours. The fact is that we live in a kakistocracy, so for reforms we need to do two things i.e. to wait and to improve our choice. Anyhow the efforts of the government should not be belittled and on the contrary they should be appreciated to a great deal. If this legislation has not made the opaque system transparent, it has surely made it diaphanous. The rampant misuse of power and money by the politicians and bureaucracy has been surely curtailed to a great extent. Even then there are certain issues which should be addressed by the Government but these discrepancies cannot be done away with overnight. The public officers provide information as per their whims and fancies; sometimes they even manipulate the data to appease the higher ups and masters. This mawkish attitude of Govt. officials is not going to be changed so quickly, but with increasing awareness the situation will surely get better. Not only Government officials but some people who call themselves RTI activists are also misusing this law to extort money from the corrupt officials. This thing also needs to be rectified and there should be a provision in the law which calls for penalisation of such elements who resort to such malafide activities. Such activities are desultory of the intent of the legislature behind framing of this law. Along with that the Government should come up with new provisions which call for stricter action against the officials who provide wrong or no information. Although there is a provision which calls for some pecuniary penalty in case of delay, but as far as my experience is concerned, the officials hardly fear this, there should be something harsher and severe than the earlier existing one.
Not only by enacting the Act, but by bringing awareness among the masses regarding the law and its provisions; the real aim behind its enactment could be achieved. Only then the people will realise that the true centre of power is not the clean and well organised Lutyens but the dirty villages of Darbhanga and far-off cliffs of Doda, the sandy villages of Kutch and the coastal regions of Kerala. It is only by empowering the ordinary citizens, a nation progresses towards greatness and this law is a small but very outstanding step in that direction. Let us all hope, this law doesn’t stay static and keeps pace with changing times !
(The author is an advocate working in Supreme Court of India & a political and legal analyst.)
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