the rti act came into force on 12 october 2005.
the rti act came into force on 12 october 2005.
when did the rti act come into force?
12 october 2005
the right to information act (rti act) was passed by parliament on 11 may 2005 and was published in the gazette of india on 15 june 2005. it came into effect on 12 october 2005 replacing the erstwhile freedom of information act, 2002. the supreme court of india had, in several judgments prior to enactment of both acts, interpreted indian constitution to read right to information as the fundamental right as embodied in right to freedom of speech and expression and also in right to life. rti act laid down a procedure to guarantee this right. under this law all government bodies or government funded agencies have to designate a public information officer (pio). the pio's responsibility is to ensure that information requested is disclosed to the petitioner within 30 days or within 48 hours in case of information concerning the life or liberty of a person. the law was inspired by previous legislation from select states (among them tamil nadu (1997), goa (1997), rajasthan (2000), karnataka (2000), delhi (2001), maharashtra (2002) etc.) that allowed the right to information (to different degrees) to citizens about activities of any state government body.
freedom of information laws by country
in august 2017, chaturvedi applied rti application to prime minister office, on 16 points which included information on quantum of black money brought back from foreign countries. by modi government and the amount of such black money deposited into account of citizens. during parliamentary elections, it was a major electoral promise of bhartiya janta party (bjp) to bring back black money from foreign countries and deposit rs. 15 lacs into account of every citizen. chaturvedi also sought information on corruption complaints against serving central ministers of modi government, copy of inquiry report and action taken on these corruption complaints. in addition, he had also sought information on various flagship schemes of modi government. initially, the prime minister office refused to give information on black money saying that it does not come under the definition of information and regarding corruption complaints against central ministers, pmo said that it was generic information. however, in a major setback to modi government central information commission (cic) in its order passed on october 16, 2018, rejected all these contentions of prime minister office and directed them to provide these information to chaturvedi within 15 days. however, in its response on november 12, the prime minister office said that though it had received complaints against various union ministers from time to time and which were duly examined also, however, to identify, examine and categorize each of these complaints, maybe "cumbersome exercise" and such an exercise will "disproportionately divert the resources of the office" and hence, citing section 7 (9) of rti act, 2005, the details were denied to chaturvedi. in the same, communication, prime minister office also refused to divulge information about black money brought from abroad, saying that disclosure of this information would affect investigation of sit into black money and hence, citing section 8(1)(h) and section 24 of rti act, which provides exemption from disclosure of information when investigation is pending and provides exemption to certain intelligence organizations from rti act, respectively, the information was denied to chaturvedi. this denial by pmo particularly on issue of black money created huge uproar with even ally of ruling bhartiya janta party, namely, shiv sena criticizing the denial in an editorial written in their party's mouth piece 'samna' saying that with this denial, mystery of black money has deepened further. in an interview with website rediff, he termed the fight against corruption as second freedom struggle. his struggle against corruption has been highlighted by various publications from time to time as a case study.
sanjiv chaturvedi