FRONT PAGE | Monday, October 12, 2009 | Email | Print | 
RTI Act to be mended
Nidhi Sharma | New Delhi
NRIs to have easy access; more agencies to come into ambit
As the Right to Information (RTI) Act completes four years of enactment on Tuesday (October 13), here is some good news. The Government is planning to introduce amendments to make it easier for NRIs to seek information, reduce the number of organisations exempt from the Act and make it mandatory for Government departments to voluntarily disclose certain types of information.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has directed Minister of State in PMO Prithviraj Chavan to get feedback from the Central Information Commission (CIC), the final appellate authority for RTI Act, on the proposed amendments. Chavan would hold this interaction with all Information Commissioners on Wednesday after the conclusion of a two-day convention on RTI in the national Capital.
Speaking exclusively to The Pioneer on the eve of fourth anniversary of the RTI Act, Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah said, “I met the Prime Minister over the proposed amendments. I discussed with him in detail the need for consulting Information Commissioners over this move. Now, the Minister of State will have an interaction with the Central Information Commissioners on Wednesday after we are done with the two-day convention.”
Habibullah clarified that there was no attempt to increase fee or exempt file notings through the proposed amendments. “There was a lot of fear about this and that is why I met the Prime Minister. I have seen the proposed amendments to the Act and there is nothing of this sort. There is absolutely no move to exempt file notings.”
One of the main suggestions of the commission, which has been included in the list of proposed amendments, is that the Act should be made more NRI-friendly. “The NRIs, being Indian nationals, can apply for information under the RTI Act, but the means for access for them are very unsatisfactory. Where do they pay the fee of Rs 10, and how? When they approach Indian embassies, they are seldom helped.”
The proposed amendment would ensure that NRIs are able to pay through the embassies or through electronic transfer.
The Government is also planning to reduce the number of organisations mentioned in the Second Schedule of the RTI Act which are exempt from disclosure norms. At present, there are 22 security and intelligence organisations which do not have the general obligation to disclose information unless it is a matter of human rights violation or corruption. These include RAW, Intelligence Bureau, DRDO, SPG, CRPF and CISF. Sources said organisations like Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) could be taken off the Schedule.
Another proposed amendment would be to bring some clarity on the issue of benches in the CIC. The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) triggered a big controversy when it said there was nothing in the RTI Act that enabled CIC’s Information Commissioners to hold separate hearings. The DoPT had also said the CIC had no powers to constitute separate benches and all Information Commissioners should hear the cases together. This controversy, however, was resolved but it brought to the fore a big lacuna in the Act.
Habibullah said, “If it is followed, we will do just five cases in a day and 150 cases in an entire month. The DoPT has come around and realised this mistake.
But we need to discuss whether it should be brought into the Act or rules framed under it.
The Karnataka State Information Commission, for instance, has included this bench arrangement in its rules. So we need to take a decision on this.”
The Chief Information Commissioner clarified that such issues bring clarity. “This will bring in greater clarity in the law and would be better for all future references,” he said.
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