UNDERSTANDING THE RIGHT TO INFORMATION (RTI) ACT

India’s democracy transformed after enactment of the Right to Information (RTI) Act in 2005. It put an end to bureaucracy’s inherent secretiveness, by establishing a system of openness and accountability, anchored in the constitutional right of free speech. Under this Act, every citizen can ask for information from “public authorities”-a term that includes any governmental agency as well as any private or other organisation substantially funded by government. Public authorities have a duty to disclose what they are doing; they must also respond within 30 days (or 48 hours in cases where the life and liberty of a person is at stake) to any requests for information by a Public Information Officer appointed to handle such requests. The law has a two-tier appeal process managed by autonomous Central and State Information Commissions that can impose penalties for non-compliance. Section 8(1) of the law sets out a limited list of exclusions, mostly related to national security and privacy, however, in a structural move that had dramatic consequences, section 44(3) of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 was amended to remove entirely the public interest balancing test applied for access of personal data and imposed a categorical bar on access of all personal data, including data related to acts of corruption by public officials, or asset declarations by public servants. Despite this legislative rollback, alongside systemic problems such as the enormous case backlog of the Information Commissions, the RTI Act continues to remain a powerful tool for the civil society to challenge corrupt and unaccountable institutions.