Right to information in India before the 2005 Act, and its place in democracy
Right to Information · Unit I · Topic 2 of 16 · 6 min read
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Cases checked to exist. Read the judgment before quoting a holding.
Every case cited here has been checked to exist — the citation resolves and names the right parties. The propositions attributed to each case have not been verified line by line against the judgment. Case names link through to the full judgment: read it before quoting a holding in an examination answer, and never carry a proposition from notes into court on trust.
1. The inheritance: a law of secrecy
The administration India inherited in 1947 was organised on the assumption that official business was confidential. Three legal instruments did most of the work:
- The Official Secrets Act, 1923, whose section 5 made the wrongful communication of official information by anyone holding office under Government an offence (discussed in the Unit IV note).
- The privilege of the State over unpublished official records relating to affairs of State under section 123 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, now section 129 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023.
- The conduct rules for government servants, which forbade communication of official documents to anyone not authorised to receive them, and the office manuals that marked files secret or confidential as a matter of routine.
The citizen had no general legal means of seeing a file, learning the reasons for a decision or checking how public money had been spent.
2. The courts: a right to know from 1975
The Supreme Court supplied the first opening. In State of U.P. v. Raj Narain (1975) Mathew J. said that the people have a right to know every public act done by their public functionaries, and that this right is derived from the concept of freedom of speech. S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981) went further and said disclosure must be the rule and secrecy the exception. These and later cases are taken up in the next note on the constitutional basis. The point here is that by the 1990s a right to information was recognised as part of Article 19(1)(a), but there was no statute to make it usable by an ordinary person.
3. The people’s movement: MKSS
The demand for a statute came from below. The Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS, the “Workers and Peasants Strength Union”) was formed in 1990 in central Rajasthan by Aruna Roy, Nikhil Dey, Shankar Singh and local workers. It began with the payment of minimum wages on government relief works. Labourers were told they had not worked the days they claimed; the muster rolls that would prove the point were official records that no one would show them.
The MKSS answered with the jan sunwai, or public hearing. Copies of muster rolls, bills and vouchers for village works were obtained, read aloud in the village and checked by the people named in them. The hearings exposed payments to dead persons, works that existed only on paper and inflated bills. The slogan was hamara paisa, hamara hisaab — our money, our accounts. A long sit-in at Beawar in 1996 demanded a legal right to obtain copies of such records.
The campaign widened. The National Campaign for People’s Right to Information (NCPRI) was formed in 1996. Drafts of a national law were prepared by the Press Council of India and others, and in 1997 a Government working group chaired by H.D. Shourie produced a draft Freedom of Information Bill.
4. State laws, 1997 to 2004
Several States legislated before the Union. Tamil Nadu and Goa passed Acts in 1997; Rajasthan and Karnataka in 2000; Delhi in 2001; Maharashtra in 2002; and others followed. These laws varied widely. Many had long lists of exemptions, few had an independent appellate body, and penalties were mild or absent. Their importance was practical: they showed that a right to information could be administered by ordinary departments without the government grinding to a halt. After the central Act came into force, the State laws were largely repealed or became redundant, because the 2005 Act applies to State public authorities as well.
5. The Freedom of Information Act, 2002
Parliament enacted the Freedom of Information Act, 2002 (Act 5 of 2003), which received assent on 6 January 2003. It was never brought into force, because section 1(3) left the date to be notified by the Central Government and no notification was issued. Its weaknesses — no independent appeal, no penalties, wide exemptions — are discussed in the Unit IV note.
6. The RTI Act, 2005
In 2004 the National Advisory Council recommended changes to make the 2002 Act effective. The Government accepted the substance and introduced a new Bill in December 2004. Its Statement of Objects and Reasons said the 2002 Act needed to be made “more progressive, participatory and meaningful” and listed the changes: an appellate machinery with investigating powers, penalties for failure to provide information, maximum disclosure with minimum exemptions, and the repeal of the 2002 Act. The Right to Information Act, 2005 (22 of 2005) received assent on 15 June 2005. Under section 1(3) a few provisions came into force at once and the rest on the one hundred and twentieth day of enactment, so the Act became fully operative on 12 October 2005. Section 31 repealed the Freedom of Information Act, 2002.
7. Significance in a democracy
The syllabus asks for the significance of the right. The standard points, each of which can be expanded with an example:
- Accountability. Ministers answer to Parliament, but between elections the citizen has few tools. Access to files lets him check what was decided and why; section 4(1)(d) requires reasons for administrative and quasi-judicial decisions to be given to affected persons.
- Control of corruption. The MKSS hearings showed that secret accounts are where money disappears. Disclosure of contracts, beneficiary lists and muster rolls makes fraud harder.
- Informed voting. The Supreme Court has repeatedly linked the right to know with free elections: disclosure of candidates’ antecedents in 2002 and 2003, and of political funding in 2024.
- Participation. A citizen who knows the facts can take part in decisions, object to a project, or use the grievance system effectively.
- Enforcement of other rights. Information about a ration card, a pension file or a land record is often the first step to getting the benefit.
The Second Administrative Reforms Commission titled its first report (2006) Right to Information: Master Key to Good Governance, which is a useful phrase to quote. Balance the answer with the costs: the burden of frivolous or voluminous requests, misuse for private disputes, and threats to applicants — problems the courts have acknowledged while refusing to narrow the right on that account.
How this is examined
The April 2021 paper set “Trace the history of freedom of information and its development prior to RTI Act, 2005 in India” (16 marks), and the November 2021 paper asked for a short note on the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan. For the essay, use the six numbered steps above and finish with the significance paragraph. Give dates: 1975, 1981, 1990, 1996, 1997, 2002, 2005. A question on the significance of the right in democracy is answered from section 7, opened with a sentence from Raj Narain.
Now try the real questions: Right to Information past question papers.