The Central Information Commission has ordered political parties to designate Public Information Officers and Appellate Authorities by 15th July. As the deadline nears, RTI activists are gearing up to counter the government’s alleged proposal to bring in an Ordinance to put political parties out of the ambit of RTI Act

In early June, the Central Information Commission had ordered all political parties to not only designate their Public Information Officers (PIOs) and Appellate Authorities (AAs)but also to implement voluntary disclosures under Section 4. Quite predictably, all the major political parties opposed the CIC decision vehemently and are now huddled together, cooking up an Ordinance, allegedly within hours from now, but in any case before 15^th July, to put political parties out of the ambit of the Right to Information (RTI) Act.
 

Stalwart RTI activists across the country had raised their up their antennas and are planning vociferous protests to nullify the Ordinance. Members of the National Campaign for the Peoples’ Right to Information (NCPRI) steered by Nikhil Dey and Anil Bahirwal, the RTI petitioner who along with Subhash Agrawal had filed the series of RTI applications in the Income Tax and other relevant public authorities, met on 9^th June in Delhi, to draw out a series of protests against the promulgation of the Ordinance. These include memorandum to the UPA chief, president of India and heads of political parties; petition by eminent people; signature campaign anddharna in Delhi during the Monsoon session of the Parliament.
 

States Bhaskar Prabhu, co-convener of NCPRI, “As per reliable sources, it is a few hours from now left to issue the Ordinance, so we need to send at least 10,000 petitions to the president of India, today itself. Letters can be sent in individual capacity or in the name of your organisation. Within the organization, volunteers, members, associates etc can also send them in individual names.” (at the end of the article, the draft letter and the email id of the president of India has been published.). Leading Mumbai-based RTI activist and former Central Information Commissioner Shailesh Gandhi has already sent the letter to the president of India and has urged citizens and activists to do the needful as early as possible.
 

The letter states that, “…citizens cannot see any reason which justifies an Ordinance. Curtailing citizen's fundamental right and issuing an Ordinance to frustrate a statutory order are morally and legally repugnant. Frustrating an existing law arbitrarily, will not promote the rule of law. I plead with you to consider whether it would be right to curb citizen’s fundamental rights by ordinance when there appears to be no need for immediate action.” 

The letter also states that, “I am sure you realise that an Ordinance should only be promulgated when there is a great urgency. Article 123 of the Constitution states (1) If at any time, except when both Houses of Parliament are in session, the president is satisfied that circumstances exist which render it necessary for him to take immediate action, he may promulgate such Ordinance as the circumstances appear to him to require.”

The NCPRI meeting on 9^th June  was attended by RTI activists AnjuTalukdar, Vipual Mudgal, Anjali Bhardwaj, Nikhil Dey, Aheli Chowdhury, NandiniDey, Anil Bairwal, Manoj (ADR), Kamal, Karamveer Shastri and Amrita Johri.

Following is the plan of action of the NCPRI:

1. Action plan against proposed RTI amendments: It was decided that the NCPRI will strongly oppose any move by the government to amend the RTI Act either by way of an Ordinance or by passing an amendment in Parliament. This will be done by-
   1. Memorandum to the president, PM, Sonia Gandhi and heads of political parties-The CIC had granted a period of six weeks to political parties to appoint PIOs and Appellate Authorities in compliance with the RTI Act. This period expires on the 15^th July and it was felt that if the government is planning to amend the RTI Act through an Ordinance then this could be done before the 15^th July. Therefore, it was decided that a memorandum opposing any amendments to the RTI Act will be prepared and will be submitted to the president, PM and Sonia Gandhi by 15^th July. After submitting the memorandum, a press conference will be held.
       
   2. Petition by eminent people- It was decided that in order to build pressure, a petition opposing any amendments would be drafted and eminent citizens would be requested to sign the petition which would then be shared with the media and also sent to political parties. A similar campaign had been done in 2006 when the government had proposed amendments to the RTI Act. We could reach out to the same people.
       
   3. Signature campaign/ Referendum- It would be useful if groups/people could organize signature campaigns in their states and send the NCPRI regularupdates on the activities undertaken to oppose the amendments. These could be put out on the website and included in press releases. It will be useful to do meetings to discuss the issue and build peoples’ awareness. We could reach out to universities and colleges and organize these meetings across the country. For this, pamphlets explaining the issue could be prepared. Signature campaigns could be carried out as part of the awareness meetings. The signature campaign could also be posted online.
       
   4. Dharna in Delhi- A dharna could be organized in Delhi during the Parliament session to oppose any amendments. A probable date will be decided once the dates of the Parliament session are announced.

2. Discussion on CIC order- The CIC order on political parties was discussed and it was decided that the NCPRI position continues to be the same as was expressed in the NCPRI press release – i.e. we welcome the order and believe that transparency and accountability in the functioning of political parties is critical. It was suggested that a meeting could be held in August with political party representatives to discuss their apprehensions about the CIC order.
    
3. It appears that the political parties do not really doubt the legal validity of the CIC order.

(Vinita Deshmukh is the consulting editor of Moneylife, an RTI activist and convener of the Pune Metro Jagruti Abhiyaan. She is the recipient of prestigious awards like the Statesman Award for Rural Reporting which she won twice in 1998 and 2005 and the Chameli Devi Jain award for outstanding media person for her investigation series on Dow Chemicals. She co-authored the book “To The Last Bullet - The Inspiring Story of A Braveheart - Ashok Kamte” with Vinita Kamte and is the author of “The Mighty Fall”.)