The
Hindu: New Delhi: Monday, November 05, 2012.
The Right to
Information Act was a marvel in a country that boasted unbreachable barriers
between the ruler and the ruled. It was outside the imagination of the ordinary
folk raised in a cloistered environment of fear and secrecy that they could
actually call for and obtain records of decisions that critically impacted
their lives. Yet in only seven years, the RTI law has not just penetrated the
fortress that was official India, but more miraculously, acquired a resilience
that its authors could not have envisaged. It is a testimony to the Act’s
strong survival instinct that last week the Union Cabinet finally withdrew a
set of draft amendments to the Act which it cleared in 2006 but did not place
before Parliament for fear of alienating the growing army of RTI stakeholders:
citizens, activists and information commissioners. Two among the proposed
amendments were potentially lethal: Disallowing access to government file
notings in all areas except those deemed to be falling in the category of
social and development, and placing ongoing executive decisions entirely
outside the purview of the Act. Had the amendments gone through, they would
have virtually rendered the government out of bounds for any RTI query, more so
given that Cabinet papers, including records of deliberations of the Council of
Ministers, are already exempt from disclosure till such time as the decisions
are considered final and complete.
Of the slew
of rights-based laws initiated by the first UPA government, only the RTI Act
has met with an impressive degree of success. The law has been empowering for
the common person. And it has played an invaluable role in uncovering scams and
scandals that would have been shut out of sight in an earlier era. From the Commonwealth
Games to the 2G scam, RTI queries have been the starting point of exposure in a
score of recent cases of corruption. Not surprisingly, the success of the law
has been its greatest threat. Though the UPA government birthed the law with
great fanfare, its effort from the beginning has been to restrict its use. It
fought to exempt file notings from the Act knowing notings were tell-tale in
nature; they could reveal why, how and under what pressure an official decision
was taken. A few days ago, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh cautioned against the
Act’s misuse, and expressed himself in favour of privacy as opposed to
disclosure. The same line was taken by the Supreme Court which also mandated
that judges must be appointed to all Information Commissions. But whatever the
challenge, the information law cannot be beaten back; the genie is out of the
bottle.
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