RIGHT TO INFORMATION AND ITS

IMPACT ON GOVERNANCE
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RTI

In order to promote, transparency and

accountability in administration, RTI is a law
enacted by the Parliament of India "to provide for
setting out the practical regime of right to
information for citizens.
The Act applies to all States and Union
Territories of India, except the State of Jammu
and Kashmir. This law was passed by Parliament
on 15 June 2005 and came fully into force on 13
October 2005.

 the preamble to the act says that the act

has been enacted for establishing the
practical regime of right to information for
citizens to secure access to information
under the control of Public authorities, in
order to promote transparency ,
accountability in the working of every
public authority.

OBJECTIVES OF RTI
Greater transparency in functioning of
public authorities
Improvement in accountability and
performance of the government.
Promotion of partnership between citizens
and the government in decision making
process; and
Reduction in corruption in the government
departments

GOVERNANCE
Governance is the process of Decision
-making and the process by which
decisions are implemented.
In other words, Governance is the exercise
of economic, political and administrative
authority to manage a countrys affair at all
Levels.

An analysis of governance focuses

on the formal and informal actors
involved in decision-making and
implementing the decisions made and
the formal and informal structures that
have been set in place to arrive at and
implement the decision.

GOOD GOVERNANCE

Good governance is an indeterminate term used in

development literature to describe how public
institutions conduct public affairs and manage public
resources in order to guarantee the realization of
human rights.
Good governance has 8 major characteristics. It is
participatory, consensus oriented, accountable,
transparent, responsive, effective and efficient,
equitable and inclusive and follows the rule of law.
It assures that corruption is minimized, the views of
minorities are taken into account and the voices of
the most vulnerable in society are heard in decisionmaking. It is also responsive to the present and
future needs of society.

RTI MASTER KEY TO

GOVERNANCE

IMPACT OF RTI ON GOVERNANCE

Civic Empowerment and Engagement are the two
most important dimensions in improving good
governance on which efforts to demand
accountability and transparency largely depend
in an anti-corruption movement.
As Right to information law, has this potentiality
with a guarantee of access to information, it can
empower citizens and engage them as well in
demanding their governments to perform better
and holding them to account for their decisions.
Access to information can empower the poor and
weaker sections of society to demand and get
information about public policies and actions,
thereby leading to their welfare

 Good governance has four elements :

transparency,
accountability,
predictability
participation.
The RTI as a tool can serve both to
Deter and Detect irregularity by enhancing
transparency and public oversight.
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 For instance disclosure of information

relating to
i) Attendance of staff in schools has helped in
checking teachers
absenteeism and students drop out;
ii) Attendance of doctors and nurses at primary
health centers has led to improvement in health
care facilities in rural areas;
iii) The details of supplies and distribution of food
grains through ration shops has assured the
reach of entitlements to the beneficiaries;
iv) The supply and demand for petroleum products,
such as, domestic gas has reduced1/30/12
black
marketing

SUCCESS STORIES OF RTI

CASE-1
In a pre-middle school in pamchampur village, situated 70
kilometers away from the district headquarters of banda, a
teacher was appointed for the school. However , the
teacher was absent for most of the times. The works and
volunteers from the Delhi based organizations like Kabir
and parivartan , along with the local workers from the
chingari sangathan under the action research villages
campaign, propagated the use of the right to information.
.

Finally, the villagers witnessed a ray of hope when

they learned that they could question the government
and ask for information related to the attendance
records, leave records and medical records of the
absconding village school teachers, fifteen villagers
drafted an application regarding the same and filed a
number applications with the primary education
officer at the banda district headquarters. They asked
for the records of the teachers but also questioned
the primary education department about the
departments role and responsibility in such
situations. Immediate action was taken on the issue
by the department. The primary education officer
summoned the teacher the very next day asked for an
explanation..

Living up to his accountability and responsibility,

the officer appointed a new school teacher for the
village school the school opened on the next day
itself and regular teacher began in the school. An
enquiry was order against the teacher and he was
asked to report to the school instantly .
The villagers were overwhelmed with the fact
that their use of Right to information could reap
such instant results

CASE -2

An RTI query has revealed major irregularities in the

appointment of clerical staff in a district court in
Gujarat, with most of them being relatives of judges.
Four years after 80 vacancies for stenographers, clerks
and peons were filled up, questions are being raised
over the transparency in which these appointments
were made. Response to an application filed by RTI
activist Janki Prasad Shah revealed that 32 of the total
80 selected candidates failed to match the age criterion
of 18-25 years. It also revealed that one selected
candidate was 48 years old and 18 candidates had not
passed the Government-approved typing examination,
a pre-requisite to apply for the job.

Notarized official documents provided by

the Dahod District court show that about
half of the chosen candidates are either
related to judges or other judicial officers.
"More than 700 applications were from the
district itself. Although all of them were
eligible, it was already decided who would
be chosen," said Janki Prasad Shah.
Interestingly, many of the full-time
appointees were already working on ad-hoc
basis. Documents also revealed that they
appointed themselves for the posts.
Although Raju Solanki's name figured on
the list of peons, it was arbitrarily removed
a couple of days later.
Both Raju Solanki and Janki Prasad Shah

CONCLUSION
Every individual have the power and responsibility
of bringing good governance by using and
spreading the use of Right to Information.
The effective implementation of this law
depends on three fundamental shifts:
(a) From the prevailing culture of secrecy to a
new
culture of openness
(b) From personalized despotism to authority
coupled
with accountability and
(c)From unilateral decision making to
participative governance

Suggestions :
Even though the RTI has proved itself as
most efficient tool in improvising
governance , it is observed that most of the
common people donot hold much
awareness on the same, therefore it is
suggested that, in order to have a better
utilization of the act and to reap more fruits
out of the law , the government should take
certain measures to educate people and
bring awareness among the people about
their rights.