Dr. Neeta Ghadge provided this ppt for law aspirants.

1. Presented by
Asst. Prof.Dr. Neeta Ghadge
PDP law College Phaltan
PhD,BSL,LLM,DLL,DCL,DCrL.

2. • Enacted by- Parliament of India
• Enacted 15 June 2005
• Assented to 22 June 2005
• Commenced 12 October 2005
• Territorial extent- Whole of India
Also Jammu and Kashmir since
August 5 2019 after Article 30
revoked.

3.  Right available to the general public to demand information
from the duty-bound Government and/or private bodies.
Provided to citizens through the Right to Information (RTI)
Act 2005.
Not constitutionally protected in direct expression, but has
been read into various fundamental rights by the Supreme
Court of India.
Forms a crucial part of the Fundamental Right to Freedom of
Speech and Expression, enshrined under Article 19(1)(a) of
the Constitution of India.
 Finds place in various international conventions, including the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
 Has gained phenomenal importance as a tool for ensuring and
promoting transparency and accountability on a widespread
level.

4.  First RTI law developed by Sweden in 1766.
Followed after two decades by the US (1966), Norway (1970), France
and Netherlands (1978), Australia, New Zealand and Canada (1982),
Denmark (1985), Greece (1986), Austria (1987) and Italy (1990).
 Idea of RTI in India brainchild of former PM, V.P. Singh in
1990.
First grassroots campaign for the introduction of RTI started by
Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) in 1994.
National Campaign for People’s RTI – Formed in 1996; formulated
initial draft of RTI law for the Government.
Tamil Nadu became first Indian state to pass RTI law in 1997.
 Freedom of Information (FOI) Act, 2002 passed.
Could not be implemented.
 Bill for current RTI Act passed on recommendations of
National Advisory Council (NAC) in May 2005, and became fully
operational on October 12, 2005.

5.  “Information” (§ 2(f)) – Any material in any form, including electronic
form, accessible by a public authority under any law in force.
 Easy procedure for filing of RTI application to Public
Information Officer (PIO) of the concerned public authority (§§ 6,
7).
Duty of public authority to comply with specified time period for
disclosure of information (§ 7(6)).
Penalty for non-disclosure of information - ₹ 250 per day till
application is received or information is furnished, maximum
penalty being ₹ 25000 (§ 20(1)).
 Duties of public authorities:
To maintain duly catalogued and indexed records relating to the
requisite or concerned information, in computerised form within
reasonable time (§ 4(1)(a)).
Proactive disclosure of particular information of public authorities
encouraged (§ 4(1)(b)).

6.  Certain types of information exempted from disclosure by
public authorities, including information relating to trade
secrets, commercial confidence, national integrity and
sovereignty, and third party incidents (§ 8(1)).
Can be declared open for disclosure if the public interest
outweighs the harm to the protected interests (§ 8(2)).
Opportunity to be given to third party about request for
information related to it, as well as any objection raised in this
regard (§ 11(1)).
 Appeals to be made first to First Appellate Authority (FAA),
and subsequently, to the Central Information Commission
(CIC) for central authorities, or State Information Commission
(SIC) for State ones (§ 19).
 Alternative remedy – Direct complaint to CIC/SIC if decision
passed by the PIO relating to concerned information not
satisfactorily.

7.  Section 20 of the RTI Act requires the Commission to
initiate penalty proceedings, in case of a violation of the
provisions of the RTI Act. Thus, it performs the function
of giving the law its teeth by acting as a deterrent from
Public Information Officers (PIOs) violating the law. But
the report found that the penalty imposed by ICs is in
an extremely small fraction of the total cases in which
penalty was imposable. It found that in a random
sample of orders of ICs, 59% orders recorded one or
more violations listed under section 20, leading to
potentially imposable penalty in 40,860 cases out of
69,254 cases. However, penalties were imposed only in
4.9% cases.

8. Chandigarh – Smoke Free City
 Hemant Ghosh – Head of
NGO called ‘Burning Brain
Society’.
 Over 300 RTI queries sent to
P&H Govt. relating to how
the Cigarette and Other
Tobacco Products Act, 2003
had been implemented in
the shared capital of
Chandigarh.
 In response, around 1800
warning boards appeared
through the city in 2007,
with Chandigarh becoming
the first smoke-free city in
India.
Fair Price Shops in Kalol
 Kerosene supplied in
Panchmahal district of
Gujarat according to the
whims and fancies of the
ration-shop owners.
 Application filed by one
Mohanbhai directly before
the District Supply Officer
(DSO), who dismissed the
complaint on wrong
grounds.
 Correct information
gathered through answer to
RTI application, with the
amount of kerosene
supplied getting increased,
along with the time for
distribution.

9. • OCTOBER 12, 2021 marked the 16th
anniversary of the Right to
Information Act, 2005 (the RTI Act).
The foundations of the law were
established by various Supreme Court
judgments which held the right to
information to be an integral aspect
of the right to freedom of speech and
expression under Article 19.
• To mark the occasion, the citizens’
group Satark Nagrik Sangathan (SNS)
prepared a report titled “Report Card
on the Performance of Information
Commissions in India, 2021”,
primarily based on an analysis of
information accessed under the RTI
Act from 29 Information
Commissions (ICs) across India under
five broad parameters – i) number of
appeals and complaints registered
and disposed of by ICs, ii) backlog
cases, iii) estimated waiting time for
the disposal of an appeal/complaint
filed in each commission, iv)
penalties imposed by the
commissions and v) transparency in
their working.

10. Recent Case Law on RTI
• Recently, in the case of Anjali Bhardwaj versus the
Union of India (2019), the Supreme Court also
observed relating to the ICs that “… in the entire
scheme provided under the RTI Act, the existence
of these institutions becomes imperative and they
are vital for the smooth working of the RTI
Act.” It found that 21 of the country’s 29
Commissions did not hold even a single hearing
during the first three phases of the country-wide
lockdown in 2020.

11. Survey on RTI
• The states of Jharkhand, Meghalaya and Tripura are
currently running without any Information
Commissioner, thus depriving the people of their right to
seek information from public authorities under the RTI
Act and leaving no recourse for them if their right to
information is violated. The assessment found that
“currently, in 3 Information Commissions in the country
all posts of Information Commissioners, including that of
the Chief, are vacant and another three Commissions are
functioning without a Chief Information Commissioner”.

12. Huge pendency backlog
• The report calculated the time
taken for disposal of
complaints using the data on
the backlog of cases in ICs and
their monthly rate of disposal.
The assessment found the
number of appeals and
complaints pending on June
30, 2021, in the 26 ICs at
2,55,602, with the
Maharashtra State Information
Commission (SIC) having the
highest number of
appeals/complaints at 74,240
as of June 30, 2021.
• Shockingly, the report
observed that the Odisha SIC
is likely to take 6 years and 8
months to dispose a matter. It
further showed that about 13
Commissions would take a
year or more to dispose a
matter, considerably higher
than the figure from the 2020
assessment wherein it was
found that nine Commissions
would take more than a year.
This trend is concerning to the
very purpose of the RTI Act,
i.e., time-bound access to
information.

13. Failures of the act and recommendations
 Poor record-keeping practices.
 Lack of infrastructure.
 Dilution of supplementary laws such as those for whistle-blower protection.
 Extremely limited awareness among people.
 Recommendations and suggestions:
 Creation of RTI Implementation Cell by both Central and State Governments.
 Reduction in scope of the information exempted from disclosure under § 8 of
the Act, both by the Parliament as well as the Courts, the Supreme Court in
particular.
 Awareness of the availability as well as benefits of RTI to the public at large,
through advertisements or mandatory trainings and workshops.

14. Need to fight back
• However, citizens are also building their strength to get the law
implemented. They have realized the power which the Act gives
them. Even during Covid-19 times many different groups are
discussing and promoting RTI through virtual platforms.
• A PIL has been filed in the Bombay High Court to ensure all
hearings by virtual platforms and also to get directions to the
Information Commissions to dispose of all cases before them in a
time-bound manner. Citizens have used e-platforms with great
enthusiasm and connections are being made across the nation.
• These may lead to the evolution of a common set of issues and
strengthening the citizen’s fundamental right. They have been
pointing out that constriction of RTI could lead to constraints on
Article 19 (1)(a) and thus on free speech and right to publish.
• A strong narrative is being built of misuse of fundamental rights
and I believe this must be opposed

15. THANK
YOU!