The story so far: In 2005, the Right to Information Act painted a revolutionary picture: empowered citizens holding a fundamental democratic right to know how their governments use money and power. It had the potential to “change the contours of democratic governance in India,” activist Aruna Roy wrote. Now, the legislation risks being reduced to a “dead letter” if governments do not fill up vacancies in the 26 Information Commission (IC) offices, the Supreme Court cautioned the government earlier this month.
India’s RTI Act, cultivated to protect people’s rights and hold the government accountable, has fallen into redundancy, a petition before the Supreme Court says. Information Commissions do not have enough officials to respond to cases as they pile up, festering into huge backlogs, delays, secrecy and inevitably impeding a citizen’s right to hold the state accountable. This regime of transparency now lies clogged, with many bodies no longer accepting RTI requests, the petitioners added.
The Central Information Commission (CIC), the figurative custodian of RTI’s spirit, is functioning without a Chief Commissioner. Further, four Information Commissioners at the CIC are set to retire on November 6, creating a gap that will leave the CIC defunct for the first time since the RTI Act was passed, co-petitioner Anjali Bhardwaj wrote on X, saying it would be a “gross violation of peoples right to information.”
