For many years, governance in India was cloaked in a veil of secrecy from the time of colonial rule. The Official Secrets Act, 1923 had deemed almost everything "secret" until the government ordered otherwise. The colonial act had erected a wall between the governing and the governed; the administration had all of the knowledge, while citizens often lacked information regarding matters that affected their lives. Ordinary citizens had almost no legal right to question why a street wasn't repaired, why his/her ration card was delayed, or how public money was being spent. It was this corrupt culture of "opacity" that bred inefficiency and arbitrary decision-making.
RTI is centered around a fundamental, yet profound, idea: people have the “Right to know” the workings of government because it is on government officials' duty to be stewards of public funds. An increasing conscious and active society expects governments to be open and transparent to facilitate just administration, to avoid corruption, and to increase public confidence. But, with democracy comes the need for an informed electorate. Transparency is the enemy of corruption, and the last two decades have seen a dramatic shift in Indian Administrative Law. This shift was accomplished through a new right, enshrined in The 2005 Right to Information (RTI) Act, which wasn't merely a law; it was a movement, promising to alter the dynamics of the "Public Authority" and common man.
Today, approximately 60-80 lakh RTI applications are submitted each year. The RTI activist community has uncovered numerous scandals, which in turn generated political responses: from the Adarsh Housing scam to irregularities in 2G spectrum allocation, from irregularities in public distribution systems to spending in Prime Minister's relief funds, RTI has provided extraordinary power to ordinary citizens seeking accountability from administration and pushing for greater transparency.
This article going to looks how the RTI Act has become an operational tool for enhancing transparency in public administration, the constitutional roots that underlie it, some of its effectiveness, the remaining challenges, what more needs to be done and whether it has genuinely enhanced transparency or whether the "culture of secrecy" still remains intact in the corridors of power.
EVOLUTION AND CONSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS OF RTI IN INDIA
The journey of making RTI began much before of 2005. In 1975, in the case of “State of U.P. v. Raj Narain”, the Supreme Court declared that the right to know is included in Article 19(1)(a). In S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (Judges transfer case) and Reliance Petrochemicals v. Indian Express, it was further described and Court clarified the right to information is a facet of the freedom of speech and expression.
Sweden have a freedom of information law in since 1766, while the “right to seek and receive information” is recognised in both Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 19) and in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) (Article 19). In India, the real push for transparency started from the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) in Rajasthan in the early 1990s. MKSS held a series of public hearings (jan sunwais) to highlight the corruption in public works.
Later on after the UPA-I government coming in power National Advisory Council tried hard and the RTI Act was passed in 2005 and came into force on 12 October 2005.
1. Constitutional Basis: Article 19(1)(a) and Article 21
Supreme Court has manytime adjudicated that the entitlement to information comprises a component of the fundamental Right to freedom of speech and expression, under Article 19(1)(a). The court in “Dinesh Trivedi v. Union of India” said that citizens have a right to know about the affairs of the government which affect them.
“The right to life under Article 21 has been interpreted to include a right to live with dignity, which requires a reasonable access to information about food, health, education, environment, etc.,”.
2. UNDERSTANDING 'RIGHT TO INFORMATION' IN ADMINISTRATIVE LAW
Definition of 'Information' and 'Public Authority'
To understand the reach of this law, we must look at Section 2 of the RTI Act, 2005.
“Section 2(f) defines "Information" very broadly. It includes any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models, and data material held in any electronic form.” This means the administration cannot say that a "file note" is not information. Even the handwritten notes by officers on a file are subject to scrutiny.
Section 2(h) defines "Public Authority." This is crucial because RTI only applies to public authorities. It includes any authority or body or institution of self-government established or constituted:
- By or under the Constitution;
- By any other law made by Parliament;
- By any other law made by State Legislature;
- By notification issued or order made by the appropriate Government.
RTI AS A TOOL FOR ADMINISTRATIVE TRANSPARENCY
1. The Legal Status of Information Commissions
The Right to Information (RTI) Act established robust mechanisms to uphold transparency in government action. It form the Central Information Commission and State Information Commissions, which are not mere symbolic entities, but also operate independent bodies of accountability. They have the authority to impose disciplinary sanctions on any official who is found to have obstructed or denied access to information without justification. Section 20 of the RTI Act 2005 states that a Public Information Officer may incur a penalty of ₹250 for each day the response to information is obstructed or denied. In this way, the Act fill governance with an element of power, and is capable of holding government officials accountable, all while embedding the attitude of accountability in the culture of governance in action. This motivates officials to be judicious and serious about all requests from citizens for information.
After that RTI has shown to be a powerful antidote to unrestrained executive discretion. In the past, an awarding of tenders or selection of candidates for public sector jobs was done without any means of public accountability or scrutiny. But nowadays RTI allow the public to access for instance, to bid comparison sheets, answer sheets at recruitment selection, and other cut-off marks, it exposes all types of irregularity and makes nepotism impossible or difficult. RTI invoke similar potential at the rural level where communities can, for example use RTI to verify muster rolls under schemes like MGNREGA. If communities can confirm whether workers on the muster roll listed actually exist, bureaucrats are less able to inflate muster rolls or create fictitious beneficiaries. Hence RTI has utility in holding administrative actors accountable, and, through the great possibility of scrutiny, pushes the administration to maintain accurate and honest records.
Also legislation acknowledges that there are reasonable limits to transparency. Section 8 of the RTI Act provide for a number of exemption, including information that may impact national security and personal information that has no relation to public activity. While these exemptions are significant, they are also not infrequently abused by officials to conceal undemocratic activities like an individual using a claim of "personal information" to conceal illegal assets. Also the law is clear that if the public interest in disclosing certain information outweighs the government’s case for exemption, the exemption will not serve as a shield. This balancing act fairly protects both privacy obligations and public oversight.
2. Judicial Interpretation and Case Studies
Our Indian courts have played a good massive role in interpreting these mentioned provisions:
1. “S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981)”: Also it is called the "Judges Transfer Case," In this case the apex Supreme Court ruled that the idea of an open government flows directly from a right to know, which it believes to be implicit 0n the right of free speech and expression guaranteed in Article 19(1)(a). The court remarked that “Secrecy is an exception, justified only when strict requirements of public interest demand it”.
2. CPIO, Supreme Court of India v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal (2019): This can be called a recent decision by court. The question was Is the Office of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) a "Public Authority"? The Supreme Court held that yes, the CJI's office is a public authority, and is subject to RTI, but in the same vein it balanced this with the "Right to Privacy". The Court held that rights of judicial independence, and accountability are co-existing rights. This ruled that no administrative or judicial office is above law.
3. Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. Central Information Commissioner (2013): In this instance, the Courts adopted a somewhat narrow interpretation of the statute. It held that "personal information" under Section 8(1)(j) meant that income tax returns and service history of an employee could not be revealed unless a clear public interest was established. This is frequently the ground cited by the administration in refusing requests about bureaucrats, assets.
CHALLENGES, JUDICIAL INTERPRETATION AND THE ROAD AHEAD of RTI
1. Major Challenges in Implementation
- Vacancies in Information Commissions (sometimes commissions remain headless for months).
- Poor compliance with Section 4 proactive disclosure.
- Frivolous and bulk applications clogging the system.
- Threats and attacks on RTI activists – more than 90 killed since 2005 (CHRI data).
- Dilution attempts: 2019 amendments giving Centre control over CIC tenure and salary.
- Overuse of Section 8(1)(j) privacy exemption and Section 24 (exempting intelligence/security organisations).
2. Key Judicial Pronouncements
Reserve Bank of India v. Jayantilal Mistry (2016): Supreme Court held that RBI cannot withhold information about bank defaulters under fiduciary exemption.
Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. CIC (2013): Personal information having no public interest can be denied.
Namit Sharma v. Union of India (2013) (later reviewed): Initially mandated judicial members in Commissions – later diluted.
Anjali Bhardwaj — Supreme Court (Feb 2019) directed filling up of vacancies and proactive disclosure of orders.
Chief Information Commissioner v. High Court of Gujarat (2020): Even judicial administration is covered under RTI.
3. Suggestions for Strengthening the Regime
- Bring political parties under RTI (as recommended by CIC in 2013).
- Amend Section 4 to make non-compliance punishable.
- Create a single national RTI portal with tracking and payment gateway.
- Strengthen protection for whistle-blowers (link with Whistle Blowers Protection Act).
- Reduce pendency by appointing more commissioners and using video-hearing extensively.
- Mandatory RTI awareness in all government training programmes.
CONCLUSION
In last, the enactment of the Right to Information Act have been a groundbreaking step in Indian Administrative Law, in which it have reshaped the balance of power from state to citizen. Hence but now that “information” is a Right, as opposed to a privilege, it has obligated the administration to be more cautious, more record-keeping, and most importantly, more accountable.
That being said the journey is not yet over. In spite of how strong the law is, the implementation is present with problems. First there look to be a considerable backload of cases within Information Commissions so much, meaning citizens sometimes have to wait years to get a simple reply. Second, the so-called “culture of secrecy” within the bureaucracy remains hard to break. Most often, officers outright decline request on weak and petty technical grounds and instead forcing citizens to go through a long appeals process.
REFERENCES
- M.P. Jain & S.N. Jain, Principles of Administrative Law (LexisNexis 7th ed. 2017).
- Aruna Roy, The RTI Story: Power to the People (Roli Books 2018).
- LexisNexis, Right to Information Act, 2005, LexisNexis Blogs (Apr. 18, 2024),
- Social Research Foundation, Publish Journal Page, Innovation: The Research Concept
- Rao, V. (2016). "The Role of RTI in Enhancing Judicial Accountability and Public Trust." Indian Journal of Public Law & Policy, 14(2), 134-149.
- State of U.P. v. Raj Narain, AIR 1975 SC 865.
- S.P. Gupta v. Union of India, AIR 1982 SC 149.
- Reliance Petrochemicals Ltd. v. Indian Express, AIR 1989 SC 190.
- Social Research Foundation, Publish Journal Page, Innovation: The Research Concept
- Dinesh Trivedi v. Union of India, (1997) 4 SCC 306.
- Central Public Information Officer, Supreme Court of India v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal, (2020) 5 SCC 481.
- Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. Central Information Commissioner, (2013) 1 SCC 212.
