What is Right to Information
Frequently Asked Questions?
What is RTI?
RTI stands for Right to
Information. Right to Information is a part of fundamental rights under Article
19(1) of the Constitution.
Article 19 (1) says that every citizen has freedom of speech and expression.
As early as in 1976, the
Supreme Court said in the case of Raj Narain vs State of UP, that people
cannot speak or express
themselves unless they know. Therefore, right to information is embedded
in article 19. In the same
case, Supreme Court further said that India is a democracy. People are the
masters. Therefore, the
masters have a right to know how the governments, meant to serve them,
are functioning. Further,
every citizen pays taxes. Even a beggar on the street pays tax (in the form
of sales tax, excise duty
etc) when he buys a piece of soap from the market. The citizens therefore,
have a right to know how
their money was being spent. These three principles were laid down by
the Supreme Court while
saying that RTI is a part of our fundamental rights.
If RTI is a fundamental
right, then why do we need an Act to give us this right?
This is because if you went
to any Government Department and told the officer there, “RTI is my
fundamental right, and that
I am the master of this country. Therefore, please show me all your
files”, he would not do
that. In all probability, he would throw you out of his room. Therefore, we
need a machinery or a
process through which we can exercise this fundamental right. Right to
Information Act 2005, which
became effective on 13th October 2005, provides that machinery.
Therefore, Right to
Information Act does not give us any new right. It simply lays down the process
on how to apply for
information, where to apply, how much fees etc.
When did RTI Act come into
force?
The Central Right to
Information Act came into force on the 12th October, 2005. However, before
that 9 state Governments had
passed state Acts. These were J & K, Delhi, Rajasthan, Madhya
Pradesh, Maharashtra,
Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Assam & Goa.
What rights are available
under RTI Act 2005?
Right to Information Act
2005 empowers every citizen to
q Ask any questions from the
Government or seek any information
q Take copies of any
government documents
q Inspect any government
documents.
q Inspect any Government
works
q Take samples of materials
of any Government work.
Who is covered under RTI?
The Central RTI Act extends
to the whole of India except the State of Jammu and Kashmir. All bodies,
which are constituted under
the Constitution or under any law or under any Government
notification or all bodies,
including NGOs, which are owned, controlled or substantially financed by
the Government are covered.
What is “substantially
financed”?
This is neither defined
under RTI Act nor under any other Act. So, this issue will evolve with time,
maybe through some court
orders etc.
Are Private bodies covered
under the RTI Act?
All private bodies, which
are owned, controlled or substantially financed by the Government are
directly covered. Others are
indirectly covered. That is, if a government department can access
information from any private
body under any other Act, the same can be accessed by the citizen
under the RTI Act through
that government department.
Isn’t Official Secrets Act
1923 an obstacle to the implementation of RTI Act?
No. Sec 22 of the RTI Act
2005 clearly says that RTI Act would over ride all existing Acts including
Officials Secrets Act.
Can the PIO refuse to give
me information?
A PIO can refuse information
on 11 subjects that are listed in section 8 of the RTI Act. These include
information received in
confidence from foreign governments, information prejudicial to security,
strategic, scientific or
economic interests of the country, breach of privilege of legislatures, etc.
There is a list of 18
agencies given in second schedule of the Act to which RTI Act does not apply.
However, they also have to
give information if it relates to matters pertaining to allegations of
corruption or human rights
violations.
Does the Act provide for
partial disclosure?
Yes. Under Section 10 of the
RTI Act, access may be provided to that part of the record which does
not contain information
which is exempt from disclosure under this Act.
Can access be denied to file
notings?
No. File notings are an
integral part of the government file and are subject to disclosure under the
Act. This has been clarified
by the Central Information Commission in one of its orders on 31st Jan
2006.
How to use Right to
Information
How do I locate the full
Act?
The full Act in Hindi and
English is available on the website of Department of Personnel and Training
www.persmin.nic.in. It is
also available on this website.
Who will give me
information?
One or more existing
officers in every Government Department have been designated as Public
Information Officers (PIO).
These PIOs act like nodal officers. You have to file your applications with
them. They are responsible
for collecting information sought by you from various wings of that
Department and providing
that information to you. In addition, several officers have been appointed
as Assistant Public Information
Officers (APIOs). Their job is only to accept applications from the
public and forward it to the
right PIO.
Where do I submit
application?
You can do that with the PIO
or with APIO. In the case of all Central Government Departments, 629
post offices have been
designated as APIOs. This means that you can go to any of these post offices
and submit your fee and
application at the RTI counter in these post offices. They will issue you a
receipt and acknowledgement
and it is the responsibility of that post office to deliver it to the right
PIO. The list of these post
offices is given at http://www.indiapost.gov.in/rtimanual16a.html
Is there any fee? How do I
deposit that?
Yes, there is an application
fee. For Central Government Departments, it is Rs 10. However, different
states have prescribed
different fee. For details see rules framed by the states on this website. For
getting information, you
have to pay Rs 2 per page of information provided for Central Government
Departments. It is different
for different states. Similarly, there is a fee for inspection of documents.
There is no fee for first
hour of inspection, but after that, you have to pay Rs. 5 for every subsequent
hour or fraction thereof.
This is according to Central Rules. For each state, see respective state rules.
You can deposit fee wither
in cash or through a DD or bankers cheque or postal order drawn in favor
of that public authority. In
some states, you can buy court fee stamps and affix it on your
application. This would be
treated as if you have deposited the fee. You can then deposit your
application either by post
or by hand.
What should I do if the PIO
or the concerned Department does not accept my application?
You can send it by post. You
should also make a formal complaint to the respective Information
Commission under section 18.
The Information Commissioner has the power to impose a penalty of
Rs 25000 on the concerned
officer who refused to accept your application.
Is there an application form
for seeking information?
For Central Government
Departments, there is no form. You should apply on a plain sheet of paper
like an ordinary
application. However, many states and some ministries and departments have
prescribed formats. You
should apply in these formats. Please read rules of respective states to
know
How can I apply for
information?
Draft your application on a
normal sheet of paper and submit it by post or in person to the Public
Information Officer (PIO).
[Remember to keep a copy of the application for your personal reference]
How can I deposit my
application fee?
Every state has a different
mode of payment for application fee. Generally, you can deposit your
application fee via:
In person by paying cash
[remember to take your receipt]
By Post through:
Demand Draft
Indian Postal Order
Money orders (only in some
states)
Affixing Court fee Stamp
(only in some states)
Banker’s cheque
Some state governments have
prescribed some head of account. You are required to deposit fee in
that account. For that, you
can either go to any branch of SBI and despoist cash in that account and
attach deposit receipt with
your RTI application. Or you can also send a postal order or a DD drawn
in favour of that account
alongwith your RTI application.
Please see respective state
rules for complete details.
Can I submit my application
only with the PIO?
No, in case the PIO is not
available you can submit your application with the Assistant PIO or any
other officer designated to
accept the RTI applications.
Where can I locate the
concerned PIO?
A list of PIOs/APIOs and
Appellate Authorities for all Central and State departments/Ministries is
available online at
www.rti.gov.in
What if I can not locate my
PIO or APIO?
In case you have problems
locating your PIO/APIO you can address your RTI application to the PIO
C/o Head of Department and
send it to the concerned public authority with the requisite application
fee. The Head of Department
will have to forward your application to the concerned PIO.
Do I have to personally go
to deposit my application?
Depending on your state
rules for mode of payment you can deposit your application for
information from the
concerned departments of your state government via post by attaching a DD,
Money Order, Postal Order or
affixing Court fee Stamp
For all Central government
departments the Department of Posts has designated 629 postal offices
at the national level. The
designated officers in these post offices work as Assistant PIOs and collect
the application to forward
to the concerned PIO. A list is available
on
http://www.indiapost.gov.in/rticontents.html
Is there a time limit to
receiving information?
Yes. If you file your
application with the PIO, you must receive information within 30 days.
In case you have filed your
application with Assistant PIO then information has to be made available
within 35 days.
In case the matter to which
the information pertains affects the life and liberty of an individual,
information has to be made
available in 48 hours.
Do I have to give reasons
why I want a particular information?
Absolutely not! You are not
required to give any reasons or additional information other than your
contact details (i.e., Name,
Address, and Phone No.). Sec 6(2) clearly says that no information other
than contact details of the
applicant shall be asked.
Can the PIO refuse to accept
my RTI application?
No. The PIO can not refuse
to accept your application for information under any circumstances. Even
if the information does not
pertain to his/her department/jurisdiction, s/he has to accept it. If the
application does not pertain
to that PIO, he would have to transfer it to the right PIO within 5 days
under sec 6(2).
Why is it that RTI works
when no other law has worked
There have been many good
laws in this country but none of those laws worked. Why do you
think this law would work?
This law is already working.
This is because for the first time in the history of independent India,
there is a law which casts a
direct accountability on the officer for non-performance. If concerned
officer does not provide
information in time, a penalty of Rs 250 per day of delay can be imposed by
the Information Commissioner.
If the information provided is false, a penalty of a maximum of Rs
25000 can be imposed. A
penalty can also be imposed for providing incomplete or for rejecting your
application for malafide
reasons. This fine is deducted from the officer’s personal salary.
Has any penalty been imposed
so far?
Yes, some officers have been
penalized by the Central as well as State Information Commissioners.
Does the Applicant get the
amount fined to the PIO?
No. The amount fined is
deposited in the government treasury. However, under sec 19, the applicant
can seek compensation.
What should I do if I do not
receive satisfactory information
What can I do if I do not
receive information?
If you do not receive
information or are dissatisfied with the information received, you can file an
appeal with the first
appellate authority under section 19 (1) of the right to Information Act.
Who is a First Appellate
authority?
Every public authority must
designate a First Appellate Authority. This officer designated is the
officer senior in rank to
your PIO.
Is there a form for the
first appeal?
No there is no form for
filing a first appeal (but some state governments have prescribed a form).
Draft your appeal
application on a blank sheet of paper addressed to the First Appellate
Authority.
Remember to attach a copy of
your original application and a copy of the reply in whatever form (if
received) from the PIO.
Do I have to pay a fee for
the first appeal?
No. You are not required to
pay any fee for the first appeal. However, some state governments have
prescribed a fee.
In how many days can I file
my first appeal?
You can file your first
appeal within 30 days of receipt of information or within 60 days of filing RTI
application (if no
information received).
What if I do not receive the
information after the first appeal process?
If you do not receive
information even after the first appeal then you can take the matter forward to
the second appeal stage.
What is a second appeal?
A second appeal is the last
option under the RTI Act to get the information requested. You can file
second appeal with the
Information Commission. For appeals against Central Government
Departments, you have
Central Information Commission (CIC). For every state Government, there is
a State Information Commission.
Is there a form for the
second appeal?
No there is no form for
filing a second appeal (but some state governments have prescribed a form
for second appeal too).
Draft your appeal application on a normal sheet of paper addressed to the
Central or State Information
Commission. Carefully read the appeal rules before drafting your
second appeal. Your second
appeal application can be rejected if it does not comply with the appeal
rules.
Do I have to pay a fee for
the second appeal?
No. You are not required to
pay any fee for the second appeal. However, some states have
prescribed a fee for that.
In how many days can I file
my second appeal?
You can file your second
appeal within 90 days of disposal of first appeal or within 90 days of the
date, by when first appeal
was to be decided.
How does this law help me in
getting my work done
How does this law work so
effectively for pending works i.e. why is it that the government officials
end up doing your work which
they were not doing earlier?
Let us take the case of
Nannu. He was not being given his ration card. But when he applied under
RTI, he was given a card
within a week. What did Nannu ask? He asked the following questions:
I filed an application for a
duplicate ration card on 27th January 2004. Please tell me the daily
progress made on my
application so far. i.e. when did my application reach which officer, for how
long did it stay with that
officer and what did he/she do during that period?
According to the rules, my
card should have been made in 10 days. However, it is more than three
months now. Please give the
names and designations of the officials who were supposed to take
action on my application and
who have not done so?
What action would be taken
against these officials for not doing their work and for causing
harassment to the public? By
when would that action be taken?
By when would I get my card
now?
In normal circumstances,
such an application would be thrown in a dustbin. But this law says that
the Government has to reply
in 30 days. If they don’t do that, their salary could be deducted. Now, it
is not easy to answer these
questions.
The first question is –
please provide the daily progress made on my application.
There is no progress made.
But the government officials cannot write in these many words that they
have not acted for so many
months. Else that would be admission of guilt on paper.
The next question is –
please provide the names and designations of the officers who were supposed
to take action on my
application and who had not done so
If the government provides
names and designations of the officials, their responsibility gets fixed.
Any officer is most scared
of fixing of responsibility against him in this manner. So, the moment one
files such an application,
his/her pending work is done.
What should I do after
getting information?
There cannot be one answer
for that. It depends on why you asked for that information and what
type of information is it.
Often a lot of things start falling in place just by asking for information.
For
instance, you would get your
passport or a ration card just by your asking for the status of your
application. In many cases,
roads got repaired as soon as the money spent on its repairs in the last
few repairs was asked. So,
seeking information and questioning the government is an important
step, which in itself is
complete in many cases.
But suppose you expose some
corruption or wrongdoing using RTI. Then, you can complain to
vigilance agencies, CBI or
even file an FIR. But it is seen that the Government does not take any
action against the guilty
even after repeated complaints. Though one can keep up the pressure on
vigilance agencies by
seeking to know the status of complaints under RTI, however, the wrongdoings
can also be exposed through
media. However, experience has not been very encouraging at getting
guilty punished. But one
thing is certain. Seeking information like this and exposing wrongdoings
does improve the future. The
officials get a clear message that the people of that area have become
alert and any wrongdoings in
future would not remain hidden as they were in the past. So, their risks
of getting caught increase.
Won’t I be victimized if I
used RTI
Have people been victimized
who used RTI and exposed corruption?
Yes, there have been some
instances where people were physically harmed when they sought
information which exposed
large scale corruption. But this does not mean that ever applicant faces
such a threat. Filing
application to seek status of your grievance or for knowing other similar
routine
matters does not invite any
retaliation. It is only when information is likely to expose
bureaucraticcontractor
nexus or any kind of mafia
that there could be a possibility of retaliation.
Then why should I use RTI?
The entire system has become
so rotten that if all of us individually and together do not do our bit, it
will never improve. If we
don’t do it, who will? Therefore, we have to act. But we should do that with
a strategy and minimize
risks. And with experience, there are some safeguards and strategies
available.
What are these strategies?
Please go ahead and file RTI
application for any issue in the first instance. Normally, anyone would
not attack you immediately.
They would first try to cajole you or win you over. So, the moment you
file any inconvenient
application, someone would approach you very politely to request you to
withdraw that application.
You should gauge the seriousness or the potential of the person
approaching you. If you
consider it to be serious enough, ask 15 of your friends to immediately apply
to the same public authority
asking for same information. It would be better if these 15 friends were
from different part of India.
Now, it would be most difficult for anyone to target all of your 15 friends
all across the country. And
if they threaten anyone from amongst the 15, let more people file similar
applications. Your friends
from other parts of India can file their applications by post. Try and give it
wide media publicity. This
will ensure that you will get the requisite information, and you would
have sufficiently minimized
risks.
Bureaucracy’s fears
Can’t people blackmail
government servants by obtaining information?
Let us ask ourselves – what
does RTI do? It just brings truth in public domain. It does not create any
information. It just removes
curtains and brings truth in public domain. Is that bad? When can it be
misused? Only if an officer
has done something wrong and if that information comes out in public. Is
it bad that wrongdoings
within the Government should become public and be exposed rather than
keeping it under wraps. Yes,
once such information is obtained by someone, he could go and
blackmail that officer. But
why do we wish to protect wrong officers. If any officer is blackmailed,
he/she has options available
under Indian Penal Code to go register an FIR against a blackmailer. Let
that officer do that.
However, we can even avoid the possibility of any individual officer from being
blackmailed by any
individual complainant by putting all information, sought by any applicant, on
the website. An applicant is
able to blackmail an officer only when that applicant is the only person
who obtained that
information and threatens to make that public. But if all information sought by
him were to be put on
website, the possibility of blackmail would be substantially reduced.
Won’t Government get flooded
with RTI applications and won’t it jam government machinery?
These fears are
hypothetical. There are more than 65 countries in the world, which have RTI
laws.
There are nine states in
India, who had RTI laws, before this law was passed by the Parliament. None
of these Governments were
flooded with applications. Such fear emanates from an assumption that
the people do not have
anything to do and are totally free. Filing an RTI application and pursuing it
takes time, energies and
resources. Unless a person really wants any information, he/she does not
file it.
Let us consider some
statistics. In Delhi, 14000 applications have been filed in 120 departments in
more than 60 months. This
means less than 2 applications per Department per month. Can we say
that Delhi Government got
flooded with RTI applications? In sharp contrast, US Government
received 3.2 million
applications under their RTI Act during 2003-04. This is despite the fact that
unlike India, most of the
Government information is already available on the net and there should
be much less need for the
people to file applications. But US Government is not contemplating
scrapping the RTI Ac. On the
contrary they are setting aside more and more resources to implement
it. During the same year,
they spent $ 32 million to implement it.
Won’t it require huge amount
of resources to implement RTI Act?
Any amount of resources
required to implement RTI Act would be well spent. Most countries like the
US have realized it and are
already spending huge resources to make their governments transparent.
Firstly, all the cost spent
on RTI gets more than recovered the same year by the amounts of money
that the Government saves
due to reduction in corruption and malpractices. For instance, there is
strong evidence to show how
leakages in drought relief program in Rajasthan and Public Distribution
System in Delhi
substantially reduced due to extensive use of RTI.
Secondly, RTI is very
essential for democracy. It is a part of our fundamental right. For people to
participate in governance,
the pre-requisite is that they first know what is going on. So, just the way
we treat all expenses made
on the running of our Parliament as essential, we have to treat all
expenses made in the
implementation of RTI as essential.
But often people file
applications to settle personal scores etc?
As written above, RTI simply
brings truth in public domain. It does not create information. Any
attempt at hiding truth or
putting a cover over it is not in the best interests of society. Rather than
serving any useful purpose,
any attempt at promoting secrecy would only increase the scope for
corruption and wrongdoing.
Therefore, our entire efforts should be to make governance completely
transparent. However, if
anyone blackmails someone subsequently, there are ample provisions
under law to address that.
Secondly, there are sufficient safeguards under sec 8 of RTI Act. It states
that any information, which
relates to private affairs of any individual and has no public interest
would not be disclosed. Therefore,
the existing laws have sufficient provisions available to address
genuine concerns of the
people.
How to avoid people from
filing frivolous applications?
THERE IS NO FRIVOLOUS
APPLICATION. What is frivolous? My pending water connection could be
the most critical issue for
me, but it could be treated as frivolous by a bureaucrat. Some vested
interests within the
bureaucracy have raised this bogey of frivolous applications. Right now, RTI
Act
does not permit any
application to be rejected on the ground that it was frivolous. But some
section
of bureaucracy want the PIO
to be empowered to reject any application if he feels that it was
frivolous. If that happens,
every PIO will declare every other application to be frivolous and reject it.
It would mean a death knell
to RTI.
File notings should not be
made public as that would prevent honest officers from rendering
honest advice?
This is wrong. On the
contrary, every officer would now know that whatever he writes on the file
would be subject to public scrutiny.
This would force him to write things which are in best public
interest. Some honest
bureaucrats have admitted in private that RTI has helped them immensely in
warding off political and
other undue influences. Now, the officers simply say that if they did the
wrong thing, they might get
exposed if someone asked for that information. Therefore, officers have
started insisting that the
seniors gave directions in writing. The Government is learnt to be
contemplating removing file
notings from the purview of RTI Act. For the above reasons, it is
absolutely essential that
file notings should be allowed to be covered under RTI Act.
Civil servant has to make
decisions under many pressures and the public will not understand this?
As discussed above, on the contrary,
possibility of exposures to illegitimate pressures would reduce.
Government records are not
in proper shape. How could RTI be implemented?
RTI would force the system
to start maintaining records properly now. Else the officials would face a
penalty under the Act
Applications seeking
voluminous information should be rejected?
If I seek for some
information, which runs into a lakh of pages, I would do that only if I need it
because I will have to pay
Rs 2 lakhs for that.This is an automatic deterrent. If application were
rejected only on this
account, the applicant could break his application and file 1000 applications
seeking 100 pages through
each application, which would not benefit anyone. Therefore,
applications should not be
rejected only on this pretext.
People should be allowed to
seek information only about themselves. They should not be allowed to
ask questions about other
spheres of governance, totally unrelated to the.
Sec 6(2) of RTI Act clearly
says an applicant cannot be questioned why he/she were asking for any
information. In any case,
RTI flows from the fact that people pay taxes, This money belongs to them
and therefore, they have a
right to know how their money were being spent and how they were
being governed. So, people
have a right to know everything about every sphere of governance. They
may or may not be directly
related to the matter.
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