RTI fast turning into ‘fight for info’: Ex-CIC

Tribune News Service
New Delhi, November 25

Former Central Information Commissioners and activists today stressed the need for transparency for sustenance of a rights-based culture and people-centric governance in the country.

“Has the Right to Information turned into a ‘fight for information’ where privacy has become the new excuse for secrecy?” former Central Information Commissioner Sridhar Acharyulu observed at a workshop on RTI. The event was organised by the Legal Aid Clinic of Jamia Hamdard University’s Law College here.

Acharyulu said the RTI was crucial for building an aware citizenry who, in turn, made erring authorities bend before a rule-of-law regime. 

“The RTI also encourages the spirit of dissent and the courage to question injustice when well-equipped with the weapon of reliable, accurate and authentic information,” he told a gathering of students, staffers and other people. 

“The combination of thinking, questioning, access to information and publicity gives rise to a unique consciousness and RTI-enabled culture,” he said.

Stressing the need for democratisation of resources to enable citizens to access information, another former CIC, MM Ansari, said the RTI revolution helped in dismantling autocratic rule and establishing democratic processes where the law was above all.

Activist and writer Afroz Alam Sahil said the RTI was the most important modern-day tool in the hands of the media industry. He said there was a compelling need for demanding governmental accountability.