Telangana RTI portal failing as 99.48% authorities stay offline: PIL

Hyderabad Mail: Telangana: Wednesday, 29 July 2026.
A law student has taken the Telangana government to the High Court over what he describes as the near-total collapse of the state’s online Right to Information (RTI) system. He presented official data showing that only 17 of more than 3,300 registered public authorities are actually using the portal to respond to citizens.

Banappagari Vinay Reddy filed a Public Interest Litigation in the High Court of Telangana. He wants the court to order the government to fix the Telangana RTI Online Portal (rti.telangana.gov.in) and introduce virtual hearings at the Telangana Information Commission. He says these steps are required by Supreme Court orders that the state has ignored for over two years.
Speaking to Hyderabad Mail, Reddy said he has been filing RTI applications since finishing his intermediate education in 2015–16. He turned to the courts after years of frustration. The RTI process offered no way to track applications and provided a digital portal that barely worked.
The petitioner received data through his own RTI application to the Information Technology, Electronics and Communications (ITE&C) Department. The state added 3,323 public authorities to the RTI portal since its launch in December 2022. Only 17 actually use it to respond to applicants. This means 3,306 authorities, or 99.48 percent, do not comply.
The same data shows that applicants filed 17,865 RTI applications through the portal between December 2023 and 2025, but officials resolved only 377, a rate of just 2.1 percent. The situation is even worse for appeals: applicants filed 2,502 First Appeals, but officials did not resolve a single one.
Reddy said, “Out of 17,000 RTI applications, officials gave replies to only 325. The rest remained pending, and the backlog has grown. Now, applicants have filed 25,000 RTI applications. Yet officials have given very few replies, fewer than a thousand people received a response in five months.”
Only 17 authorities using portal
Major public authorities, such as the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC), the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA), and Osmania University, reportedly do not use the portal. The Telangana Information Commission’s 2023 annual report lists 17,768 designated Public Information Officers (PIOs) and 2,228 First Appellate Authorities statewide. These numbers are much higher than the roughly 3,300 authorities currently registered on the portal.
Reddy compared Telangana’s approach with other states. The National Informatics Centre (NIC) gives RTI portal software to states for free. Telangana, however, paid a private vendor consortium about Rs 2.07 crore for the portal’s design and hosting. More than Rs 1.51 crore has already been paid.
Reddy’s second main issue is that the Telangana Information Commission still refuses to hold hearings online. Reddy explained, “The RTI Act’s appeal process allows applicants to file a First Appeal if they do not receive a reply in 30 days and to file a Second Appeal with the State Information Commission if they do not receive a reply to the First Appeal. The Commission can take three to six months just to list the case.”
Reddy said applicants living in Khammam, Wanaparthy, or elsewhere must travel to Hyderabad in person for a hearing, even though the hearing itself often lasts only a few minutes. “Citizens suffer because they do not receive information and because they must pay to travel for the appeal, while government officials simply claim travel allowances,” he told HyderabadMail. He estimated each appeal costs an applicant about Rs 12,000.
Petition seeks functional RTI portal
The petition argues that the Commission directly violates a 2023 Supreme Court ruling (Kishan Chand Jain v. Union of India, decided October 9, 2023). The Supreme Court said that adjudicatory bodies must use technology like video-conferencing and ordered all State Information Commissions to offer a hybrid hearing option by December 31, 2023. More than two-and-a-half years after the deadline, the Telangana Commission still has not complied, according to the petition.
Reddy said the Commission started trying a Google Meet option only after he filed his PIL. He called it a token gesture, not a real rollout. “They started it after we filed the PIL, just as a sample to show the court,” he said.
Reddy says he personally filed 32 RTI applications and 25 First Appeals through the Telangana portal and received substantive responses to only five. He says thousands across the state have had the same experience. He appealed to the Court only after sending unanswered requests to the Chief Secretary, the ITE&C Department, and the Information Commission between August 2025 and March 2026 for nearly seven months. The court will hear the case next on August 3, 2026.

NTA Rot Much Deeper Than Pradhan: Documents Show Why Exam Agency Keeps Failing

The Quint: Kohima: Wednesday, 29 July 2026.
NTA Governing Body met twice in 30 months, faces staff shortages and ignored recommendations, RTI responses reveal.

The National Testing Agency, responsible for India's largest exams, has faced major governance lapses—rare board meetings, secrecy, mismatched records, unfilled senior posts, and unimplemented reform recommendations—even as lakhs of students are affected and crores of surplus funds remain unused. Why do the agency’s structural weaknesses persist despite frequent crises, tougher laws, and repeated calls for reform?
(The Quint has consistently reported on the crisis in Indian education. Help us do more such stories by becoming a member.)
Every year, millions of Indian students put their future in the hands of the National Testing Agency (NTA). The government body conducts some of India's biggest competitive examinations, including NEET (for medical college admissions), JEE (for engineering admissions), CUET (for university admissions), and UGC-NET (for teaching jobs). Since its establishment in 2018, NTA has conducted more than 270 examinations and handled over 6.6 crore candidate registrations. In 2026 alone, the agency has already conducted 12 examinations involving more than 65 lakh registrations.
NTA describes its mandate in ambitious terms. It states that its objective is to conduct examinations that are "valid, reliable, efficient, transparent, fair" and ensure that "the right candidates" reach "the best institutions."
However, information obtained through the Right to Information (RTI) Act, responses provided in Parliament, and findings of Parliamentary Standing Committee reports present a very different picture of the agency's functioning. The records point towards deeper governance concerns — the governing board that does not meet frequently, limited transparency in the implementation of statutory mechanisms to prevent unfair means and examination fraud, significant vacancies in sanctioned posts, and inconsistencies between information provided by NTA and facts recorded by Parliament.
Together, these findings raise questions not only about individual examination failures but also about the institutional systems responsible for safeguarding the country's largest entrance examinations.
Governing Board Met Only Twice in 30 Months — Not Even After the NEET-UG Crisis 
The job of overseeing NTA belongs to its Governing Body, think of it as the board of directors for the whole agency. But an RTI reply shows this board met only twice in the 30 months between 1 January 2024 and 1 June 2026 — a period that covers both the NEET-UG cancellation and the CUET postponement. For the top body in charge of the country's one of biggest exam agencies to meet less than once a year, even while its exams are falling apart one after another, is itself a sign of neglect.
In fact, the Governing Body did not meet even after the NEET-UG exam was called off till one of the biggest exam crises the agency has ever faced, and the very crisis that would go on to trigger weeks of street protests and, eventually, a minister's resignation. (Note - NEET UG called off on 12 May and reply of the RTI is till 1 June ) 

This is made worse by secrecy. When I sought the for copies of the minutes of these meetings, NTA refused, saying the "Minutes cannot be shared as contains information that is confidential in nature and may hamper the integrity of the examinations." So the public has no way of knowing what, if anything, the Governing Body actually discussed.
What Happens After a Paper Leak? NTA Isn't Sharing the Answers 
The secrecy does not stop at board minutes. NTA has also refused to share basic details about how it is dealing with paper leaks and cheating, the very problem that the government has now moved to address at the legislative level.
In 2024, Parliament passed a law called the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024. Section 9 of this Act says every public examination authority must set up a mechanism for monitoring how the Act's provisions are implemented. An RTI request asked NTA to explain the system it has set up for this. NTA's reply simply said it has formed a committee — called the Unfair Means (UFM) Committee — to look into cheating cases and recommend action. It gave no further details on how this system actually works or how it is monitored.
The same RTI request also asked for details of every reported cheating case or offence — including copies of complaints or police FIRs, and the current status of each case. NTA said this information is "not maintained in the format sought," meaning it does not keep records in the way the applicant asked for, and that the RTI Act does not require it to create new information just to answer a question.
NTA also refused to hand over two specific documents — called Form 1 and Form 2 — that the 2024 law requires officers in charge  and examination centre to fill out whenever a cheating case or offence is detected. NTA said these records are part of an ongoing investigation and are therefore exempt from disclosure under a specific section of the RTI Act meant to protect investigations.
This matters more than ever now. The Cabinet's newly cleared amendments to the 2024 Act raise jail terms for organised examination fraud from three-to-five years to five-to-ten years, raise the maximum fine to ₹10 crore. Tougher punishment on paper may mean little if the agency responsible for detecting and reporting cheating in the first place will not even disclose how its own internal monitoring system works, or hand over the basic case records the law requires it to keep.
Information Mismatch: When NTA's RTI Replies Differ From Parliament's Record 
An RTI query sought information from NTA to list every exam and result that was postponed, cancelled, or re-conducted between January 2024 and May 2026, and reasons for the same. NTA's answer named only two events: a UGC-NET re-exam held in computer-based mode between 21 August and 4 September 2024, and a NEET-UG re-exam held in pen-and-paper mode on 21 June 2026.
That short list does not match what the Parliamentary Standing Committee itself has recorded. The Committee found that of the 14 competitive exams NTA ran in 2024, at least five ran into serious trouble: UGC-NET, CSIR-NET and NEET-PG all had to be postponed; NEET-UG saw paper leaks; and CUET (UG/PG) had its results delayed. The Committee did not mince words, saying "NTA's performance in the last year has not inspired much confidence."
The committee also noted that in JEE Main 2025, held in January 2025, at least 12 questions had to be withdrawn due to errors found in the final answer key of this major engineering entrance exam. The Committee noted that mistakes like this shake the confidence of students in the whole system, and said NTA "need[s] to quickly get their act together" so that such fully avoidable errors do not happen again.
NTA's RTI reply tells a very different story from the findings of the Parliamentary Standing Committee. This raises an obvious question: why is the information given to RTI different from what Parliament itself has recorded? 
Recommendations on Paper, Reforms Missing on Ground 
In a letter posted on Twitter (X), the then education minister Dharmendra Pradhan had said that he was committed to ensuring that no deserving student's future would be ruined by what he called the "examination mafia," and that no student would suffer injustice. Information provided by the Education Ministry itself suggests his ministry's actions did not fully match that promise. 
In its report tabled in Parliament in December 2025, the Parliamentary Standing Committee said that private companies banned by one state or organisation for problems such as paper leaks, conducting exams, or evaluating answer sheets are still able to get contracts elsewhere. To stop this, it recommended that the government create a single nationwide blacklist of such companies and the people behind them.
To check whether this had been done, an RTI application was filed with the Education Ministry asking for a copy of the blacklist. In its June 2026 reply, the Ministry said it did not have any such information. This shows that, even months after the Committee's recommendation, the nationwide blacklist had still not been created.
The Committee has also asked, twice now,  most recently in its 364th Report — that NTA publish a full Annual Report describing its work in detail and submit it to Parliament every year, instead of just an audited financial statement. When an RTI request sought copies of the Annual Reports NTA had actually submitted to Parliament, the agency simply replied: visit the official NTA website.  As of 25 July 2026, no such report exists there.
A Crackdown Without Capacity: NTA's Empty Chairs Problem 
Amid the fallout from the paper-leak scandals, the Government has announced that it has terminated (removed from service) 47 officials of NTA. News reports  say legal and criminal action may follow against some of them. This has been presented as a strong step towards reform.
But the RTI data points to a deeper problem than punishing a few individuals. NTA's sanctioned permanent staff strength, the number of permanent posts the government has officially approved is only 39, backed up by 124 people working on a temporary basis. Of the 39 permanent posts, 38 percent are vacant, meaning empty and unfilled. The gap is worst at the senior level: of 13 sanctioned Director posts, only 4 are filled — a vacancy rate of nearly 70 percent as per the RTI reply. 
An agency running national exams where millions of candidates apply every year by its own numbers, working without close to a third of its permanent sanctioned staff — and without most of the senior directors who would normally be expected to watch over exam integrity. A new law with harsher penalties will still need people to enforce it; on current numbers, NTA does not have them. 
A Cash-Rich Agency With a Capacity Gap
If NTA's record on running exams and governing itself looks weak, its finances tell a different story. A reply given in the Rajya Sabha on 22 July 2026 lays out, year by year, how much NTA earned and spent from 2019-20 to 2023-24  and in every single one of those five years, the agency earned more than it spent. Add up the last column and NTA saved close to ₹520 crore over just these five years.
This matches what Parliament's own Standing Committee had already found. The Committee's 371st Report, titled "Review of Autonomous Bodies and Institutions" and presented to the Rajya Sabha on 8 December 2025, noted that NTA collected an estimated ₹3,512.98 crore while spending ₹3,064.77 crore on conducting exams over six years, leaving a surplus of ₹448 crore. 
The Committee recommended that this money be used to build NTA's own ability to run exams itself, or to strengthen its checks on the private vendors it depends on. The RTI record shows no sign that this has been carried out, even though that surplus could, in principle, have funded exactly the kind of staffing and oversight capacity the agency is now shown to lack.
NTA reforms: Another Committee, Two Years later
The Prime Minister's announcement of a new task force to reform the National Testing Agency (NTA) comes nearly two years after the Centre had set up a similar high-level committee following the 2024 NEET-UG controversy.
The NTA came under severe criticism in 2024 after allegations of irregularities in the NEET-UG examination and the cancellation of the UGC-NET exam over concerns about its integrity. The controversy triggered nationwide protests, with students and opposition parties demanding sweeping reforms and, in some cases, the agency's dissolution.
In response, the Ministry of Education constituted a seven-member High-Level Committee of Experts on 22 June 2024 under the chairmanship of former ISRO Chairman Dr. K. Radhakrishnan. The committee was asked to recommend reforms to improve the examination process, strengthen data security, and review the NTA's structure and functioning.
The committee submitted its report to the government on 21 October 2024.
After the NEET-UG 2026 paper leak, the NTA announced on 19 May 2026 that it was strengthening its leadership and institutional framework. In a press release, the agency said four senior officers from the Government of India had been posted to the NTA, including two Joint Secretary-level officers who would serve as Additional Director Generals "as per the recommendations of the Radhakrishnan Committee."
This indicates that at least some of the committee's recommendations had begun to be implemented even before the Prime Minister announced a new task force headed by Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani to recommend further reforms for NTA-conducted examinations.
The announcement of another expert panel, however, raises important questions. How many of the Radhakrishnan Committee's recommendations have been implemented? Which recommendations remain pending? If the earlier reforms were implemented, what shortcomings remained that required a fresh committee? If they were not implemented, why was another panel constituted instead of acting on the existing recommendations?
The Bigger Picture
A minister has resigned. A tougher law is on the way. Fast-track courts will be set up to deal with exam fraud. These are major steps, taken after weeks of protests by students. But changing the law and replacing people addresses only the immediate crisis, not the deeper problems.
The findings in this investigation point to those deeper issues: a Governing Body that rarely meets, secrecy over how paper leaks are handled, RTI replies that do not match Parliament's records, recommendations that remain unimplemented, large vacancies in key posts, and hundreds of crores of rupees lying unused despite repeated calls to strengthen the agency.
Taken together, these are not isolated administrative lapses. They point to weaknesses in the way NTA is governed. Every year, the agency collects thousands of crores of rupees in exam fees from students and their families. Yet the body responsible for overseeing it meets infrequently, key information remains hidden, and many senior positions remain vacant.
Unless the next Education Minister and the next NTA leadership fix these structural problems—not just punish individuals or pass stricter laws—the same failures are likely to happen again, no matter what the law says on paper.

RTI data reveals Nagaland’s widening divide between policy and practice : Atono Tsükrü Kense

Morung Express: Kohima: Wednesday, 29 July 2026.

As the Nagaland Government initiates a high-level manpower audit to streamline staffing across all departments, a recent Right to Information (RTI) response has laid bare the persistent administrative challenges that underscore the urgency of this exercise. 
While the state has constituted a ‘Working Group on Comprehensive Manpower Rationalisation’ with a strict three-month deadline to review sanctioned posts, identify redundancies and assess the impact of technology on staffing, the RTI data reveals a system straining under unresolved cadre reviews, widespread reliance on additional charges, and uneven distribution of officers, particularly within the civil and police services. 
The findings come as the government imposes interim restrictions on new recruitments, highlighting a critical push to balance administrative efficiency with fiscal consolidation against a backdrop of delayed cadre revisions and the creation of multiple new districts in recent years.
40 NCS officers hold additional charge:
The Nagaland government continues to depend on significant number of officers to manage multiple administrative responsibilities as the cadre review process constituted in 2021 is still underway.
An RTI response from the Department of Personnel & Administrative Reforms (P&AR) has revealed that 40 Nagaland Civil Service (NCS) officers are currently holding ‘additional charge’ while the cadre review is yet to be completed despite creation of several new districts in the recent years.
The reply, issued on July 15 in response to an RTI application, provides an overview of the present strength of the NCS cadre, staffing position across districts, vacancies and the status of cadre review.
According to the department, Nagaland currently has a sanctioned strength of 308 NCS posts, of which 296 are filled, leaving 12 vacancies, including posts that have already been requisitioned.
The department, however, stated that it has no records available on the sanctioned strength of the NCS at the time of Nagaland’s statehood in 1963.
It also pointed out that no cadre strength revision was carried out in line with the creation of new districts in 1973, 1997, 2003, 2022 and 2024.
District-wise deployment:
The RTI reply shows considerable variation in the distribution of NCS officers across districts.
Among the districts, Mon has the highest number of NCS officers with 19, followed by Zunheboto (18), Phek (16), and Kohima and Mokokchung with 14 each. Wokha has 13 officers, while Kiphire and Peren have 11 each. Chümoukedima and Tuensang have 10 officers each, Longleng has nine, Niuland and Shamator have eight each, Noklak has seven, Dimapur has six, and Meluri and Tseminyu have five officers each.
Additional charge & transfers:
The department disclosed that 40 NCS officers are presently holding additional charge of more than one sub-division or posting simultaneously.
It further clarified that there is no prescribed duration for holding additional charge, stating that such arrangements are made based on administrative convenience.
The RTI reply also revealed that 74 officers were transferred and posted through notifications issued on March 31, 2026.
Of these, 15 officers were posted to the six newest districts viz. Noklak, Chümoukedima, Niuland, Tseminyu, Shamator and Meluri. However, only six of those postings were against previously vacant regular positions, indicating that many postings were adjustments rather than appointments to vacant sanctioned posts.
Previous cadre reviews:
As per the available records, the government said cadre reviews were undertaken through notifications and official communications issued in 2006, 2010, 2016 and 2018. The latest cadre review, constituted in 2021, has yet to be completed.
The RTI response also noted that the minimum NCS complement for each district is governed by government notifications issued in 2004 and 2022, copies of which were enclosed with the reply.
Overall, the RTI response highlights the continuing gap between sanctioned and actual staffing, the widespread reliance on additional charge arrangements, and the prolonged delay in finalising the cadre review, despite the creation of several new districts over the years.
Posted strength of NPS Cadre:
Meanwhile, the RTI response offers a snapshot of the current deployment of NPS cadre officers across Nagaland and provides insight into how senior police personnel are distributed among operational, administrative and training establishments throughout the State.
The Nagaland Police Headquarters (PHQ), along with its specialised wings, has the highest concentration of Nagaland Police Service (NPS) officers in the State, according to an official document obtained through the Right to Information (RTI) Act. The document provides a detailed breakdown of the posted strength of NPS cadre officers across police units, district establishments and Nagaland Armed Police (NAP) battalions.
The posted strength of the NPS cadre stands at 241 officers, comprising 44 officers in the ranks of AIG, Commandant, SP, Principal and Joint Director, and DCP, 59 officers in the Deputy Commandant, Deputy SP, Additional SP and ADCP category, and 138 officers serving as Assistant Commandant, Deputy SP, SDPO and ACP.
Among all establishments, Police Headquarters (PHQ), including Crime, Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) and Border units, has the largest deployment with 16 officers. The Inspector General of Police (Intelligence) follows with 13 officers, while Commissioner of Police, Dimapur has a sanctioned posted strength of 10 officers.
Across district police establishments, Kohima has the highest posted strength with seven officers, followed by Mokokchung, Zunheboto and Wokha, each with five officers. Mon, Peren and Phek have four officers each, while Tuensang, Kiphire, Longleng and Tseminyu have three officers each. Noklak and Meluri have two officers each, while Shamator has the lowest deployment with one officer.
The RTI document also highlights the distribution of officers across the Nagaland Armed Police battalions. The 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 10th, 11th and 14th NAP battalions each have 10 posted officers, the highest among the battalions. The remaining battalions have between eight and nine officers.
Other specialised institutions include the Police Training School (PTS) with two officers, the Nagaland Police Training Centre (NAPTC) with four officers, the Counter Insurgency and Anti-Terrorist School (CIATS) with two officers, and the office of the Deputy Superintendent of Police (Prosecution) with six officers.
The document notes that the figures exclude officers serving on deputation, including the Commandant Rank officer serving as Commanding Officer to the Village Guards, the Superintendent of Police Rank officer posted as Chief Security Officer to the Civil Secretariat, and the Deputy Commandant Rank officer serving as ADC to the Governor.
This is the last of a two-part series.
https://www.morungexpress.com/from-3-to-17-is-the-number-of-districts-affecting-nagalands-good-governance

Only 2.1% of RTI applications on State online portal dealt with: Law student moves Telangana High Court : Satyendra Wankhade

Bar and Bench: Litigation News: Wednesday, 29 July 2026.
As per information obtained by the petitioner through RTI, of 2,502 first appeals filed through the portal, not a single one has been disposed of.

Telangana High Court

A law student has moved the Telangana High Court flagging a disposal rate of only 2.1% for Right to Information (RTI) applications and zero for first appeals filed through the Telangana RTI Online Portal. [Banappagari Vinay Reddy v. State of Telangana and Ors]
A Bench of Justices P Sam Koshy and Narsing Rao Nandikonda on Monday granted the Telangana State government one week to file a counter affidavit.
The public interest litigation (PIL) was filed by Banappagari Vinay Reddy, a Medak-based law student, appearing as a party-in-person.
The Court also clarified that the prayer seeking transfer of the design, development and hosting of the RTI Portal to the National Informatics Centre (NIC) would not fall within the purview of the PIL.
According to official data Reddy obtained through RTI applications filed with the Information Technology, Electronics and Communications (ITE&C) Department, only 377 of the 17,865 RTI applications filed through the Telangana RTI Online Portal since its launch have been disposed of.
Of 2,502 first appeals filed through the portal, not a single one has been disposed of. The data further discloses that while 3,323 public authorities have been onboarded onto the portal, only 17 are actually using it for RTI disposal. That leaves 3,306 authorities, or 99.48 percent of those onboarded, non-compliant.
The petition seeks a direction to the State to ensure effective onboarding of all public authorities, public information officers and first appellate authorities on the portal.
It also seeks enforcement of the Supreme Court's binding directions in Kishan Chand Jain v. Union of India, which mandated hybrid hearings at all State Information Commissions by December 31, 2023.
The Telangana Information Commission has not met this deadline. As per the plea, this has forced RTI appellants from across the State, including from remote districts such as Adilabad and Khammam, to travel to Hyderabad for hearings. The petitioner has also relied upon the Supreme Court's directions in Pravasi Legal Cell v. Union of India, which mandate the operationalisation of RTI portals across all States.
The matter is next listed for hearing on August 3.
The Telangana Information Commission and ITE&C Department was represented by Government Pleader Pradeep Kumar.
[Read Order]

Indians demand more info than ever and government finds new ways to say no : By Rohini Mohan

ANN: Bengaluru: Wednesday, 29 July 2026.
Public information officers (PIOs) appointed in every department are responsible for responding to queries within 30 days, failing which they will be penalised at the rate of 250 rupees (S$3.40) for each day of delay.

The Indian government has been receiving more requests for public information, but replies are dwindling. PHOTO: TAMIL MURASU/THE STRAITS TIMES

How much did the Indian Prime Minister spend on foreign trips? How many children rescued from trafficking were rehabilitated? How many sexual assaults led to convictions? When were tenders issued for a ministry digitisation project?
These were the eclectic range of questions Indians from across the country asked the federal government in 2025, using the country’s transparency and accountability law.
The Right To Information (RTI) Act, passed in 2005, gives Indians the right to ask for data or information from authorities in public interest, barring rare exemptions. Public information officers (PIOs) appointed in every department are responsible for responding to queries within 30 days, failing which they will be penalised at the rate of 250 rupees (S$3.40) for each day of delay.
The Central Information Commission’s (CIC) Annual Report 2025 published in February 2026 showed a record rise in the number of RTI applications, with a 30 per cent growth in the financial year 2024-2025 since the Covid-19 pandemic. This demonstrates an abiding interest among Indians to hold authorities to account as well as the increasing ease of filing applications digitally.
Five ministries – Corporate Affairs, Finance, Railways, Education and Defence – comprise a quarter of the 2,303 public authorities but received over half the total number of all RTI applications filed in 2024-2025. The Ministry of Corporate Affairs led with about 254,000 requests, followed by the Ministry of Finance, with around 220,000 applications.
The Ministry of Corporate Affairs reduced its massive backlog by about 87 per cent from the previous year to only 1,619 in 2024-2025. It rejected only 306 RTIs.
Kansara Gopal, a steel shop owner from Rajsamand in Rajasthan, has filed applications since the RTI was passed, inspired by the grassroots movement for the law launched only 15km from his home town. The campaign for government transparency in the 90s was led primarily by daily wage labourers and farmers in Rajasthan before it turned into a nationwide movement that included lawyers, activists and other professionals who helped draft what’s often called the people’s law.
Gopal has requested information about 50 times on various issues, like whether the police protocol was followed to remove street vendors and the justifications provided for an internet shutdown in Delhi during the Gen Z protest in July.
“I deploy the information from each to reveal corruption or the absence of due process. RTI is a great way to pressure the government to get work done. Information received through RTI is also effective in courts, and it bolsters petitions we file,” Gopal told The Straits Times.
He has filed a petition about bringing private colleges under the purview of the RTI Act and many appeals with the CIC against denial of information by various public authorities.
Over the past decade, both the quality and frequency of responses from the government has dwindled, according to data and the experience of RTI activists.
An analysis of the CIC report by the Delhi-based Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) found that backlogs are rising, response rates are falling, and constitutional bodies are reporting inaccurate data. The authorities responded to 4 per cent fewer RTIs than the previous year, and around 58,000 requests, accounting for about 3 per cent of applications, were rejected.
The RTI law has 10 exemption clauses to deny information, such as for national security reasons. The ministries of Finance, Home Affairs and Defence rejected the most number of requests. But the CHRI analysis revealed that in almost four of every 10 rejections, the reasons for denial were not specified.
A frequent excuse for withholding information is that the information asked for was deemed personal, not public, said Pankti Jog, 50, who runs a helpline for people filing RTI applications to government bodies in Ahmedabad, Gujarat.
She cited the case of Ramanbhai Parmar from Adas village in the Anand district of Gujarat, who had filed an RTI in May 2025 asking for a copy of the minutes of a village council meeting. This meeting had granted permission to a corporation to build commercial warehouses on community land. However, the Gujarat Information Commission denied him the public records, reasoning that the meeting minutes would have signatures of the village leaders, which was personal information that could be misused to commit financial fraud.
“How is a commercial company’s registration personal information? How is the attendance register of a village meeting confidential?” asked Jog.
Former Madhya Pradesh state information commissioner Rahul Singh wrote to the Gujarat Information Commission on June 29, 2026, that this denial was “not legally sustainable” and that restricting access to public records of the village council weakened accountability at the grassroots level. The commission did not change its stance.
“These are frustrating excuses misused to hide wrongdoing and corruption. Denial should be the exception, but these days, denial is the norm and getting information is the exception,” Jog said.
Transparency activists told ST that the 2023 Digital Personal Data Protection Act has been counterproductive to the RTI Act as it allows officials to deny access to “personal information” without having to prove that privacy harm outweighs the public interest.
In Jharkhand state, child rights activist Baidnath Kumar, 50, said officials had found new delay tactics to discourage information seekers. In 2025, when he asked for statewide data on the total number of police complaints filed on child trafficking and the number of rescue operations conducted, his query was transferred to hundreds of police stations across the state.
“I have been getting bits of replies from 480 police stations over the past two years, when the state’s police chief could easily give me the consolidated data instead. It is an attempt to tire me out. They misuse bureaucracy to discourage citizens from demanding information,” said Kumar, who is patiently waiting to collect the data before he demands better protection of trafficked children.
Even more starkly, the CHRI analysis revealed that of the total penalty of 156,000 rupees that was imposed on officials for failing to provide information, only 453 rupees was collected – a sign that ad hoc amounts were being charged and errant officials were being let off easily.
“Even more bewildering are the claims” of tiny penalty amounts collected from several ministries, like two rupees from officials at the Ministry of External Affairs and one rupee from the Department of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. These figures are much lower than the minimum penalty of 250 rupees that can be imposed under the RTI Act, the CHRI report noted.
Despite delays in receiving information, the filing of applications under the RTI Act has steadily risen over the years.
Mansoor Umer Darvesh, a stationery shopkeeper in Mumbai, has filed at least 200 RTI applications.
Many of the 66-year-old’s RTIs have had immediate impact, such as one asking about the money spent on street lights that made the municipality install the lights overnight, and one about the expenses of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s foreign trips that resulted in the expenses being made public and made the news. Another about the progress of Bollywood actor Salman Khan’s 2002 hit-and-run case in which a homeless man was killed exposed that crucial case files had been inexplicably destroyed.
He told ST that for an ordinary citizen, “even as the RTI replies are getting shorter and less thorough, it remains an opportunity to turn the tables of power, to scare corrupt officials and remind the authorities that the people are watching them”.

RTI shocker: CWMA has no updated data on Cauvery reservoirs’ siltation

Times of India: Hubballi: Tuesday, 28 July 2026.
The Cauvery Water Management Authority (CWMA) has admitted through a Right to Information (RTI) reply that it lacks updated information on siltation, live storage loss and sediment management in Karnataka’s four major Cauvery reservoirs Krishna Raja Sagara (KRS), Hemavati, Harangi and Kabini after 2009, environmental activist Sadananda Heggadadalmath of Kottur said.

Heggadadalmath said he sought the information through an RTI application filed on June 20, 2026. In its reply dated July 23, the CWMA’s central public information officer stated that no updated hydrographic or remote-sensing survey reports on live storage capacity loss in the four reservoirs had been received after 2009.
The RTI reply also stated that the authority had no year-wise siltation survey data for the reservoirs from 2010 onwards.
According to the reply, CWMA had no information on whether siltation-induced storage loss was considered while regulating water releases under the Water Year concept and distress-year provisions following the supreme court’s Feb 16, 2018 order.
It further stated that no information was available on communications, notes or decisions regarding siltation loss and its impact on inter-state water sharing since 2018.
The authority also said it had no information on whether it had directed or proposed a joint survey by the Central Water Commission (CWC) and Karnataka Engineering Research Station (KERS) to assess current live storage loss.
The RTI response added that CWMA had no information on whether it assessed excess monsoon spills from Karnataka reservoirs reaching Tamil Nadu due to reduced storage capacity.
It also stated that no information was available on measures taken to implement sediment management and reservoir maintenance in the Cauvery basin in line with the National Water Policy.
Further, the authority said it had no information on the status of making reservoir siltation data, storage loss figures and inflow-outflow data publicly available on the CWMA dashboard.
Referring to the RTI reply, Heggadadalmath alleged that the absence of updated surveys meant the actual storage capacity of the reservoirs remained unknown.
He claimed that continuing water releases without such data was unscientific and undermined transparency and accountability in inter-state water management.
In a separate letter to the CWC, Heggadadalmath urged the agency to address the issue. He said water-sharing and drought-management decisions were being made using outdated design capacities.
He sought immediate collection of the required data, assessment of live storage loss in major reservoirs, and ensuring that future water allocation and drought-management decisions are based on actual live storage capacities. He also urged the CWC to place updated reservoir data in the public domain.

RTI reveals 11 check gates leased by KHADC without tenders, KHNAM demands action

Hub News: Shillong: Tuesday, 28 July 2026.
The Khun Hynniewtrep National Awakening Movement (KHNAM) has urged the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council to cancel all existing work orders for 11 check gates leased by the Trade Department and to issue fresh open tenders for transparency.

KHNAM working president Thomas Passah

In a letter to the Chief Executive Member/Executive Member in-charge Trade, KHADC on Monday, KHNAM working president Thomas Passah alleged that the Council has been leasing out check gates to private individuals without inviting tenders.
Citing RTI responses, Passah said that in 2025 the Trade Department had leased out 10 check gates without a tender process. The Council at the time cited shortage of time as the reason.
However, a fresh RTI filed in July 2026 revealed that 11 check gates have now been leased out through work orders issued between October 2025 and June 2026.
The locations include Mawshynrut, Bangli in South West Khasi Hills, Borsora, Byrnihat, Mawiong Khri, Umiam, Athiabari in West Khasi Hills, Baridua in Ri-Bhoi, Majai, Mawryngkneng, and Nongprut in Nongstoin.
“The concerning matter is that in 2026, one more check gate has been added to the 10 from 2025. What is even more concerning is that even after more than a year, KHADC has neither issued any public notice nor called for tenders to operate these check gates,” the letter stated.
KHNAM further alleged that the Council continues to award contract, supply and repair works to private individuals without any tender process.
It also criticized previous Executive Committees for handling such works “in a careless manner” despite repeated representations.
The organization has demanded that the EC cancel all the current work orders and issue a public notice inviting open tenders for the check gates and other contract works.
“We strongly demand that the EC cancel all these work orders and call for open tenders… so that the indigenous people of the state can also participate and there will be transparent governance in the KHADC,” KHNAM said.
The group added that it hopes the current EC’s “words and actions will go together” to ensure clean and transparent administration in the district council.

Navi Mumbai Faces Construction Waste Management Gap

Urban Acres: Navi Mumbai: Tuesday, 28 July 2026.

Navi Mumbai Faces Construction Waste Management Gap

Fresh questions have emerged over the city’s ability to manage construction and demolition waste after information obtained through the Right to Information (RTI) Act indicated the absence of an integrated system for handling debris across major urban development zones. The findings come as Navi Mumbai undergoes rapid infrastructure expansion, raising concerns over environmental compliance, illegal dumping and long-term urban sustainability. The issue has gained significance as redevelopment projects, Metro construction, cement concrete road upgrades, flyovers and large residential developments continue to generate substantial volumes of construction waste management material. Urban planners have long argued that without a coordinated collection, transport and processing network, debris can end up in wetlands, low-lying areas and ecologically sensitive locations, undermining sustainable city planning.
According to information sought from planning and civic authorities, several key details relating to an official debris disposal policy, designated dumping locations, processing facilities and authorised transport mechanisms were either unavailable or not furnished. During the subsequent appeal process, officials reportedly clarified that debris disposal is currently governed through project-specific contractual provisions rather than a unified city-wide framework. The response has intensified debate over whether fragmented arrangements are adequate for a metropolitan region witnessing continuous construction activity. Experts note that while individual infrastructure contracts may prescribe disposal conditions, the absence of a common construction waste management strategy can make monitoring, enforcement and environmental accountability more difficult across multiple agencies. A similar information request submitted to the municipal corporation reportedly did not receive a response within the prescribed timeline, prompting a separate appeal. Civic activists argue that enforcement against unauthorised dumping becomes challenging when citizens, contractors and smaller developers are not provided with accessible disposal facilities or an officially recognised transportation network.
The concerns extend beyond regulatory compliance. Improper disposal of construction debris can obstruct natural drainage channels, damage mangrove ecosystems, increase flood vulnerability and contribute to dust pollution, all of which carry significant environmental and public health costs for rapidly urbanising regions. Activists have also referred to unverified claims from a contractor suggesting that, in the absence of sufficient authorised facilities, debris from public works is sometimes transported through informal arrangements to locations outside the city limits. While these allegations remain independently unconfirmed, they underscore broader concerns regarding transparency in the movement and disposal of construction waste. The matter has previously attracted judicial attention, following litigation concerning illegal debris dumping in the Vahal area. A high-level committee was subsequently constituted by the Urban Development Department to examine the issue, although campaigners contend that a comprehensive operational framework has yet to emerge.
Urban policy specialists believe Navi Mumbai now has an opportunity to integrate digital tracking, licensed transport operators, designated recycling facilities and mandatory waste management plans into future development approvals. As infrastructure investment accelerates across the metropolitan region, establishing a transparent and circular construction waste management system could become essential to protecting natural ecosystems while supporting responsible urban growth.

Where are the 717 closed shops? Tasmac won’t say

DT Next: Chennai: Tuesday, 28 July 2026.
Asked details under RTI on shops, head office passes buck to districts

Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation (Tasmac) Shop

Providing copies of reports submitted by district officials on the implementation of the order to close 717 liquor outlets after the TVK-led government came to power would affect its day-to-day functioning, claimed the Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation (Tasmac).
In response to a query under RTI, the State-run corporation also asked the applicant to approach its 38 district offices for details on the liquor shops that were closed.
The response came to an RTI application filed by a Coimbatore-based petitioner, Yuvaraj Ramalingam, who sought records relating to the government's decision that came into effect following an order passed in May 2026.
In its reply, Tasmac said all 717 identified shops had been closed. However, it refused to furnish the information on the district-wise list of the shops, along with shop numbers, addresses, and reasons and dates of closure, and instead gave him the addresses of all district offices and told him to approach the respective district managers.
The same response was given when he sought the date on which each of the 717 shops was closed, details of shops that had been relocated, shifted, or reopened elsewhere, and the district-wise list of new Tasmac retail outlets opened after May 12.
"The head office asked me to approach all 38 district managers separately. Why should a citizen be made to run from one district office to another for information? Is the administration so inefficient that even the head office does not have this data, or is the information being withheld," he questioned.
He added that shop numbers alone were of little use as there was no publicly accessible database through which citizens could identify a shop's location.
"Without the addresses, the public cannot independently verify whether the identified shops were actually closed or whether alternative outlets have been opened nearby.
The minister had put out shop numbers. What's stopping the HQ to give addresses? If the government has nothing to hide, why not disclose the complete list," he asked.
He had also sought copies of the district-wise compliance reports submitted by Tasmac district managers regarding the closure. While rejecting the request, it cited the administrative burden involved in furnishing them instead of making clear if the compliance reports were unavailable or did not exist.
The corporation invoked Section 7 (9) of the RTI Act to decline to provide the records, stating that furnishing the information would disproportionately divert the resources of the public authority and affect its day-to-day functioning.

Opinion | A Rs 5,000 Fine Can't Fix India's 'Babu' Raj. But It's A Start : Madhavan Narayanan

NDTV: Opinion: Tuesday, 28 July 2026.
A new bill in Delhi imposes a fine of Rs 250 a day on bureaucrats, with a Rs 5,000 ceiling, if their service for citizens is delayed without a valid justification. Can this fix India's great 'Babu' bottleneck?

One small step for the government, and a giant leap for governance?
That's the question that popped up in my mind this week as I read about an interesting decision by the Delhi government's cabinet to fine officials a maximum of Rs 5,000 if their service for citizens is delayed without a valid justification. If it is approved as expected, the Delhi (Right of Citizen to Time Bound and Ease of Delivery of Service) Bill replaces/upgrades a similar 2011 Act. As the name suggests, it holds itself accountable to citizens with a proposal to impose a fine of Rs 250 a day, with a Rs 5,000 ceiling.
In principle, this is a great idea and also reflects an increasing democratisation of governance in which elected leaders pressure the bureaucracy to do what is expected of them. But there is a very long way to go, because in India, which the UK's The Economist magazine once described as "a natural habitat of the clerk," there is a lot to do to undo the process-driven bureaucratisation that the magazine's land of birth itself left in its imperial stamp on its colony.
The very same magazine recently ran a self-explanatory editorial titled, "Why can't India's government build a decent website?", and moaned about clunky online experiences among "failures of "Indian officialdom". Any casual watcher of the old BBC comedy series, "Yes, Minister", would be assured that "Great" Britain has been not so great in political control over bureaucrats. The culture is such.
It does get tricky. How do you hold bureaucrats and lower-level government officials responsible in a system in which incentives and disincentives have to be balanced with costs, processes, and public accountability to legislators and institutions like the Comptroller and Auditor General? A rule-based system cannot easily function like an incentive-based culture or a severe hire-and-fire mechanism.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government is officially aware of the bureaucracy problem, but the solution requires re-engineering a culture from the bottom up.
The ongoing controversy over the alphabet soup of state-run public examinations, NEET, CUET, and CBSE school exams, suggests that ministers and bureaucrats need to be sensitive to an increasing mass of aware citizens demanding accountability and efficient service. Again, the buck-passing involving politicians and so-called autonomous bodies, such as the National Testing Agency, shows that you cannot have autonomy without accountability, and you cannot absolve yourself of a responsibility by pointing to a structural autonomy designed to reduce bureaucratisation.
Much like the inflation-interest rate trade-off in macroeconomics, this requires a trade-off between empowerment that improves efficiency and transparency that ensures there is no abuse of power.
Outsourcing things to private agencies, often risking underhand corruption as well as the "L1 syndrome" in which the lowest bidder in a contract need not necessarily be the best service provider, is a trade-off between transparency at low cost and the public's desire to get better services.
In this context, any attempts to backpedal the Right to Information (RTI) Act or its procedures must necessarily be seen as regressive. A culture of transparency needs to be baked into the bureaucracy to avoid the cloak of official secrets over government muddles.
But, as anyone who has stood in a long queue at railway stations or electricity offices in India would testify, a lower-end government servant facing the public has to go through stresses that match that of the suffering citizen in the queue. New technologies can help only so much, as The Economist magazine's editorial comment would testify.
Officially, India's civil servants do receive formal training in citizen-centric work, with emphasis on ethics and empathy. There is a National Training Policy framed in 2012 to help. There are specific training institutes, behavioural curricula, and digital grievance mechanisms. But I could not suppress a chuckle as I stumbled on a bureaucratic online file on this very thing whose language, structure, and communication style were a throwback to old "babudom". It had long, jargon-filled paragraphs on processes that would go over the heads of even media outlets, not to speak of ordinary citizens.
What we perhaps need are recruitment of people based on personality traits that reveal higher EQs (emotional quotient). In casual conversations in India, some workers are often described as having a "good nature" or "helpful attitude" - and these often have less to do with training and more to do with the way human beings are. An emphasis on EQ over IQ (intelligence quotient) in recruitment, training, and deployment can go a long way to make services that appeal to the public. We need smart but sensitive civil servants -including lowly officials who directly face disadvantaged citizens. This requires the courage to recognise that "soft" people skills are as important, if not more, than high scores in public examinations.
Union Cabinet Secretary TV Somanathan recently sent out a note to all secretaries (top bureaucrats) in various departments, asking them to take care of small things and avoid bureaucratic repetition of processes. Such moral nudging is desirable but of limited utility. Recognition of various kinds, not just plum postings, should be matched with disincentives of the kind the Delhi government has proposed.
As is often said in management lessons, leadership is set by example. You cannot have authoritarian ministers lording over empathetic bureaucrats, or authoritarian bureaucrats managing empathetic clerks at railway counters! You do need tough authority, but one that is consciously aware of where and how it is to be used.
The Modi government has been running a corporate-style assessment system with scorecards for ministries presented by the cabinet secretary. This is a welcome beginning. Cultural transformation requires a different DNA. Neither a purely corporate style, nor a monarchically authoritarian structure, and nary the lapsed colonial bureaucratic process serves the purpose. The holy grail lies between efficiency and empathy.
(Madhavan Narayanan is a senior editor, writer and columnist with more than 30 years of experience, having worked for Reuters, The Economic Times, Business Standard, and Hindustan Times after starting out in the Times of India Group)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author