The article talks about the challenges faced by the Right to Information Act (RTI), which was passed nearly 20 years ago to help make the government more transparent and allow citizens to request information.
Unfortunately, over time, some parts of the government have tried to weaken the law. They’ve done this by changing the rules or delaying responses to requests for information, making it harder for people to use the law effectively.
One of the main issues is the shortage of staff in the Information Commissions, which are responsible for handling complaints from people who are either denied information or don’t receive any response at all.
These commissions are meant to ensure that the RTI Act is working properly. But many of them are understaffed, which means they can’t deal with all the cases.
For example, the Central Information Commission (CIC) has eight vacant positions, and there are 23,000 cases waiting to be heard. Some state-level commissions are also struggling because they don’t have enough people to handle the complaints, leaving them barely functioning.
The Supreme Court has noticed this problem and raised concerns about how these commissions can work properly if there aren’t enough staff to handle the workload.
The Court has ordered the Department of Personnel and Training to come up with a plan to fill the eight vacant positions in the CIC within two weeks.
It has also asked for more details about the hiring process, such as how the candidates are being chosen. The Court has also told states to finish filling vacancies in their own commissions within a specific timeframe.
But the article points out that simply filling these positions might not be enough to fix the problems with the RTI Act. Back in 2019, the Court had already directed the government to fill vacancies faster by advertising the positions earlier, but that hasn’t happened yet.
In addition, the CIC’s independence has been reduced because the government removed the fixed five-year term for commissioners, allowing their tenure to be open-ended. This change made the commission less independent and gave the government more control.
Another issue is that most of the people appointed to these positions are retired civil servants, rather than people with different backgrounds and experiences.
The Court has noted this and suggested that the government should consider a wider range of candidates to ensure the commission is diverse and representative.
In conclusion, the article argues that having so many empty positions in the Information Commissions has led to a huge backlog of cases, which can discourage people from using the RTI Act.
This, the article suggests, may be the goal of those in power—weakening the law by making it harder for people to access information and reducing its effectiveness.
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The Editorial Page of The Hindu is an essential reading for all the students aspiring for UPSC, SSC, PCS, Judiciary etc or any other competitive government exams.
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