Deccan Herald: Bengaluru: Tuesday,
March 14, 2017.
Right to
Information Act is not only a tool for transparency, but it also enables a
channel of communication between the government and the people, preventing the
latter from taking to extremism to get justice, social activist and India’s
first information commissioner Wajahat Habibullah said on Monday.
Delivering a
lecture on ‘RTI and National Security: Contradiction or Confluence,’ Habibullah
said Right to Information allows people to unearth facts that citizens can use
to further improve governance. The P K Dey annual memorial lecture was organised
by the School for Democracy, Rajasthan.
“RTI should
not be used solely to put government on the defensive. It is an effective tool
to work with the government in a constructive way,” he said.
Social
activist Aruna Roy, who commented on the lecture, took the example of Maoist
menace in Chhattisgarh to emphasise that suppression of people’s participation
drains their confidence in democratic institutions and democracy itself. “Ask a
question about corruption or abuse of power and you are immediately branded as
a terrorist,” she said.
The activist
said police once called her a Moaist for staying in a village since they didn’t
see any point in an educated person working with villagers. “We need to change
this mindset. Today, the government is more opaque than ever. People should act
to hold the authorities accountable,” she added.
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