Petition to
Mrs Sonia Gandhi
New Delhi.
Dear Madam,
Sub: An appeal to save Indian democracy.
We are appalled to learn that the Cabinet has approved an amendment to exempt file notings and cabinet papers from disclosure under the Right to Information Act (RTI) 2005. We are shocked that a progressive UPA government that fathered the Act has chosen to take this retrograde step and kill the act in its infancy.
In the last few years, RTI has emerged as a very effective tool in the hands of a common man to check corruption, fight injustice and make governance transparent. The proposed amendments would make RTI ineffective. This will prevent people from knowing why a particular decision was taken and who said what in that decision-making process. It will prevent people from knowing why no action was taken on their applications and who the guilty officials were. In effect, the Government would end up protecting the corrupt and dishonest officials.
It is strange that at almost the same time when the cabinet was approving such retrograde amendments, the Prime Minister was making a speech on how RTI could improve governance. He stated "This Act, by promoting transparency, can be a vital instrument for cutting down corruption and ensuring that goals set for improved public service delivery can be met."
One wonders how would transparency be promoted by exempting file notings and Cabinet papers? How would service delivery improve if you protect the identity of guilty officials? One gets a feeling that PM’s speeches are mere rhetoric and the Government does not mean what it says.
Mr O P Kejariwal, Member Central Information Commission, recently said that "Information minus the file notings amount to taking the life out of the RTI Act".
The Act is just 10 months old. The Government should have given at least a few years before attempting to amend it. Nine state governments have RTI Acts for the last seven years or more. File notings were being given under those Acts. No bureaucrat in any of these states felt threatened the way bureaucrats working in the Central Government seem to be feeling.
Such an excellent Act came in existence only due to your personal intervention. We hope you would again intervene and prevent your own Government from killing it.
We have decided that we will not vote for our sitting MPs if he/she did not vote against the amendment bill in the Parliament.
Sincerely,