POLITICAL PARTIES OUT OF THE PURVIEW OF THE RTI—Election Commission

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THE NEWS

Recently, the Election Commission has said in an order that Political parties are out of the purview of the Right to Information Act, which is contrary to the directive of the Central Information Commission (CIC) to bring six national parties under the law.

BACKGROUND:

  • The order came on the appeal of an RTI applicant seeking to know the donatons collected by the six natonal partes which were brought under the ambit of the law by the CIC in June 2013.

ABOUT THE ORDER:

  • The Electon Commission order is based on the recent remark by the Central Public Informaton Officer (CCPIO#, which says that “The politcal partes are out of the purview of the RTI Act and may submit informaton on donatonnamount collected through electoral bonds in their contributon report for 2017-18 in the ECI, for which the due date is September 30”.

CIC’s CONCERNS:

  • The CIC had declared all natonal and regional politcal partes as public authorites under the RTI in its 2013 order.
  • Six of the seven partes — the BJP, the Congress, the BSP, the NCP, the CPI and the CPI (CM# — for which informaton was sought were brought under the RTI Act by a full Bench of the CIC on June 3, 2013.
  • As per the RTI Act, the CIC is the only appellate authority, which may declare a body public authority if it is convinced that it meets the criteria for being under the Act.
  • The CIC has made a very liberal interpretaton of Secton 2 (Ch# of the RTI Act, leading to an erroneous conclusion that politcal partes are public authorites under the RTI Act.

WHY SHOULD POLITICAL PARTIES NOT COME UNDER RTI ACT?

Politcal partes cannot disclose their internal functoning and fnancial informaton under the Right to Informaton Act, as it will hamper their smooth functoning and become a weak spot for rivals with malicious intentons to take advantage of.

WHY IS RTI CRUCIAL FOR POLITICAL PARTIES?

  • The RTI Act mandates tmely response to a request for informaton from a public authority. Since its genesis, the RTI Act has been used to fght corrupton and has exposed the deeprooted graf in the country, such as big scams like the Adarsh Housing Society scam, 2G scam, etc.
  • Politcal partes represent citiens of the country at various levels of the government and voice people’s demands and needs in the administratve sphere and therefore serve as the link between citiens and the government. Thus, if RTI is not extended to politcal partes, the attempt to make a foolproof transparent system will be in vain.

CONCLUSION:


Right to informaton act was passed to bring transparency in the system by making it a legal right to get informaton from any public body with some exceptons. In a democracy like India, where even the supreme law of the country – the consttuton – derives its authority from the people, politcal partes are supposed to be accountable to the masses whom they claim to represent.

SOURCE:- Chanakya IAS

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