An independent assessment of the functioning of the Right to Information Act 2005 in the last two years in five States has found alarmingly high levels of pendency of appeals and several instances of violations of mandatory norms of pro-active disclosure under Section 4 of the RTI Act.
Releasing the report, ‘People’s Monitoring of the RTI Regime in India 2011-13’ on Friday, activists criticised the systematic weakening of the law in the study period. They pointed out that while previously three attempts to dilute the law by the central government through amendments in 2006, 2008, 2013, had failed following public outcry; the Act was now being weakened through neglect of important appointments and lack of provisions of resources at State level.
“The Central Chief Information Commission is headless since no chief has been appointed since August when the post fell vacant. This will increase the already massive pendency of over 25,000 cases. The delay in this appointment raises issues about the legal validity of orders passed in the interim,” said Anjali Bhardwaj, Coordinator of the study done by RTI Assessment and Advocacy Group and Samya-Centre for Equity Studies and member, National Campaign for People’s Right to Information.
Delays, pendency
With delays in disposal of cases and information commissions working at less than required strength, there is increasing pendency of cases in many states. The study calculated that given the existing backlogs, if an applicant filed an application in Madhya Pradesh Information Commission which had disposed only 6 percent cases , the hearing would be expected to come up for hearing in 60 years. The same number for West Bengal was calculated at 18 years.
No pro active disclosures
Nearly two thirds of the RTI applications in the sample were found to be seeking information that should have been proactively made public under section 4 of the RTI Act. “Despite a strong provision for pro active disclosure under section 4, there is poor compliance as authorities do not put up boards with required proactive disclosures or make available publications in their offices which citizens could inspect to access information on public issues,” said Shekhar Singh, the study's coordinator. The researchers who relied on over 800 RTI applications to various information commissioners, inspections, interviews, group discussions, found several states commissions had not published mandatory annual reports on RTI implementation since over five years.
An assessment by the activists in 2009 had found better implementation as well as high awareness levels on the Act, especially in rural areas.
