RTI and electronic accessibility

Thursday, 31 March 2016 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

I am glad the much-awaited Right to Information (RTI) Bill has been presented to Parliament after having been endorsed by the Provincial Councils.

Sec 3 of the Bill says every citizen has the right to information which is in the possession of a Public Authority. Sec 43 defines what a Public Authority is. The definition is wide enough to cover everything in which public has a genuine stake or interest.

But there is big lacuna in the Bill. There is no obligation on the Public authority to keep the relevant information in electronic form so that it is always available to the public. Indian RTI Act has Sec 4 which makes it obligatory on the Public Authorities to keep the relevant information on a network to be available all over the country. There are 17 items included in the list. http://www.righttoinformation.gov.in/rti-act.pdf

We have Sec 7 in our RTI Bill but it does not impose any obligation on the Public Authority to maintain relevant information on a network accessible to the public. It does not give any list as such. This means public have to write to the Public Authority even for basic information.

I hope the Opposition parties will take up this issue so that Sec 7 of our RTI Bill will be amended to make it obligatory on the Public Authority to keep information in electronic form accessible to the public.

Y. Yoheswaran

Dubai