PM Signals Dilution Of RTI act And Ignites Nationwide Debate

About two days back Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said that there is need to make few changes in RTI act, but if we take a look at the history of the formation of this act, we will get to know that it took years of debate and went though number of changes and reviews before seeing the daylight, and if we take a look at its present state then we get to know that information like:-

• Information related to sovereignty and integrity of nation,
• Information forbidden by court of law,
• Discloser of information which could cause the breach of parliament,
• Information related to trade secrets,
• Information received in confidence from foreign Government,
• Information which could endanger the life or physical safety of a person,
• Information which could impede the process of investigation,
• Cabinet papers including records of deliberation of council of ministers, secretaries and officers,
• Personal information which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual

Have already been excluded from RTI, now is there any further room to dilute it? And still if any attempt is made to dilute RTI law then it will make it ineffective, and in that case there will be no purpose of this act, so in that case instead of diluting it, it’s better it should be abolished.

We have heard several members of UPA boasting and praising themselves for making an RTI act, and they hardly ever get tired of taking credit for it, and they consider it as the biggest achievement of UPA government, and now by signaling some changes in RTI they are actually planning to kill their own achievement.

In the recent past some members of UPA have expressed the need to make changes in RTI, and it’s understandable because they might have been feeling uncomfortable due to RTI, but when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh who is known for his impeccable integrity and Image, behind whom entire UPA hides its sins says so, then it’s really unfortunate and a matter of deep disappointment, and before making such statement he must have realized that by diluting RTI law he is not going to do any favor or service to the nation on the contrary UPA will lose its whatsoever remaining credibility among people of India.

In the short span of life of RTI we have seen its effects, It brought some transparency in the system and proved itself as an effective tool in fighting corruption and poor governance, we have seen the number of scams and irregularities exposed and revealed by RTI, like how can we undermine the role of RTI in exposing Adarsh society scam, CWG scam, Mining scam, 2G scam and many other scams and irregularities which may not have been exposed without RTI.

But when P.M says that RTI should not affect the work of government then he actually means that RTI applications are acting as hindrance in functioning of government, and when he says so, he must also explain how RTI is affecting the work of government and it’s functioning.
There is high probability that PM gave such statement because of the recent 2G mess which troubled government for about 7-8 days, in which a Finance Ministry note revealed that, then Finance Minister P.chidambaram is responsible for not auctioning 2G spectrum, and may be because of this revelation which was done through RTI, now UPA government is trying to dilute this law Itself, so that they don’t land into any further embarrassment, and in other words UPA actually is trying to shoot the messenger.

It’s a well known fact now, that RTI has actually empowered the common-man of this nation, and for Indian nationals RTI has proved out to be a weapon by the medium of which, even a common-man can question the authorities, there have been several incidents in which during judicial proceedings people have produced facts derived by RTI proving that other side is lying.
And UPA is willing to dilute such an important law, and if they actually plan to do it, then before that, they must explain to the people of this country why they are doing so? But according to my understanding it seems that UPA which is completely cornered by scam after scam is doing it under panic, they first deliberately ignited this debate by the medium of their members, and now they brought their “big gun” the Prime Minister to signal it, and to get the mood of the nation.
 

But the message which comes out from these things is that, the activities of UPA are suspicious, and it raises some serious doubts on the intentions of UPA, and the only means by which UPA can put an end on all these doubts is, by stating publicly and assuring people of this nation that, they are not going to dilute RTI.
We have also seen that there have been some demands of bringing corporate under RTI law, and instead of strengthening RTI, UPA is planning to dilute it?

Even if after getting the sense of nation on this issue, and after watching the outrage spread across the nation on this stand of UPA, if still UPA is planning to move ahead with their suspicious intentions and approach, then they must also get prepared to face the wrath of common man.