Yesterday I attended a talk by Arvind Kejriwal, one of the pioneers of the Right To Information Act and the winner of the Magsaysay award. He is on a lecture tour of the US.
RTI as described by Wikipedia :
“The Right to Information Act 2005 (Act No. 22/2005)
[1] is a law enacted by the
Parliament of India giving
Indians access to
Government records. Under the terms of the Act, any citizen of
India may request a department of the Central Government, State Government or
Public Sector company or bank for information on almost any question related to the department or company's functioning. The government body is expected to comply within thirty days, failing which the officials responsible for non-compliance face financial penalties and, in persistent cases, jail terms. The Act also requires government bodies to publish certain specified information on its web site.”
It was an eye opener to hear case studies of common people circumventing corruption via RTI :
- Pending applications (ration card etc ) being processed
Information demanded:
Why haven’t I received my ration card after many months beyond the upper bound?
Give me a daily progress report on my application since date of filing.
Which officers are responsible?
What action is taken against these officers?
- Siphoned off rations being detected by people who are below poverty line.(There ration cards and the Daily sales register completely disagree leading to conclusion that in Delhi 90% plus food grain was misplaced under public distribution)
Information demanded:
Simply give me access to the Daily sales register at a ration shop.
- Roads and other public works being physically inspected by common folks and ability to correlate actual work done with grants etc
Information demanded:
Access to files providing details on size of project and bids for contractors etc.
Access to samples of construction material used.
And the list goes on and on.
On speaking with him it seems the biggest threat to this tool seems to be the Information Commission itself since it fails to penalize officials which fail to provide information within 30 days (Proposed penalty is slary deduction of Rs 250 per day after 30 days have elapsed since filing of RTI) I found a related news story almost immediately corroborating the point:
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/14504.html He has asked NRIs to write to the President (who is actually supposed to read his emails!) with recommendation that Information Commissions should be run by retired judges rather than by bureaucrats.
I personally don’t except anybody who didn’t see his presentation to find the enthu to petition for change. But you can spread the word that corruption is not the only choice back home. For Rs 10 folks can file an RTI application instead. Apparently it works!
Some links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_Information_Act http://persmin.nic.in/RTI/WelcomeRTI.htm