Indian democracy is what I describe as a defective, elective democracy.
We say we are a democracy because we have elections. We have a constitution.
But it does not deliver to the individual citizen.
The individual citizen, usually if he comes to a government office, goes out feeling
frustrated and humiliated and angry.
This is because we've not learned to respect the individual citizen.
Right to information gives that.
The fact that a person can
question the decision of a information commissioner, or a Supreme Court judge, or a governor, or
a chief minister,
changes the whole way the power equation works in democracy.
I'm an engineer by training from IIT Bombay.
About 15 years back I decided I want to do something socially relevant.
At that time Maharashtra, the state from which I come,
brought in a very good right to information act.
To me the most important thing is that right to information
empowers an individual citizen
sitting in her own house,
into questioning
and making some change in the whole governing structure.
For a law that's just 7 years old,
there are a number of commissions where cases are being heard after 2 years and 3 years.
What I saw is that they were not doing adequate work
and piling up pendencies,
and if backlogs built up
they would become like the Indian judicial system
which I believe doesn't deliver to the citizen.
They invited me to be on the Commission,
and I grabbed the opportunity
since I thought I could make a difference
by demonstrating what can be done.
I have in the last 3 years and 9 months
disposed over 20,000 cases.
My office works without any paper files.
It's the only office in the whole country
in terms of information commissions that has no paper files.
We get everything digitized and we use the digitized image on a computer.
This computer file is then open for everybody to access.
Another person usually prepares the summary,
the background of what's the main issues in the appeal.
The RTI applicant went where, what dates, what happened.
That becomes the background to the case.
Someone else then fixes a date of hearing,
which is usually 3 to 4 weeks later.
So that it gives enough time for postage and so on.
For people who are not near or in Delhi,
we offer them video conference facilities.
Citizens or the PIOs go to the NIC center,
and from there, we can see them on the screen
and talk to them.
In India the average user is actually the citizen
who's trying to get his petty grievance addressed.
An RTI application is filed with a public information officer.
If a person's not satisfied he goes to a first appellate authority.
If he's not satisfied with that, he comes to a commission,
which is a final appellate authority for right to information.
>>What I was trying to tell you is that he said he followed the legal processes, but
>>he didn't.
>>And he had already built a five-story building there.
The commissioner is expected to hear appeals
and judge on them,
decide whether the information can be given as per the law,
whether the public information officer has acted
as per the law,
in giving information in 30 days as is required.
And if he doesn't do it,
the commissioner has the power to penalize the public information officer
at the rate of rupees 250 per day
with a maximum cap of 25,000 rupees.
If we did not have a penalty provision,
this act would have been toothless and worthless long time back.
>>Okay, do one thing. Do a joint inspection of this property.
>>Together, both of you, look at the property and
>>take pictures and create a report.
The PIO has given information, as per records.
It appears that
the Interior officials are
not recording
certain unauthorized
building construction on their records.
Generally, the number of cases listed per day is between 20 and 25.
I must warn you, there are also a lot of people who say that I'm also very rude.
Which is true.
I am trying to run a fairly tight schedule.
You come for a hearing, you don't even know what is happening.
And whatever comes to your mind, you'll say it.
That's what's happening.
You are correcting yourself while sitting here!
I don't want to be rude.
But I believe the poorest man in the country pays for me.
This time is very precious.
I'm a public health activist.
And I also filed for public interest litigation in the Supreme Court
on the deaths which occurred during clinical trials all over India
and the compensation paid to the clinical trial victims.
>>These companies, these pharma companies
>>are very strong. They don't often report to DCJ.
I have no opposition to clinical trials and even if I had that's not the subject matter.
The matter is only,
with respect to deaths suspected to have occurred out of clinical trials.
On something like this,
if the government is not sensitive,
I think there is a serious problem.
A very serious problem.
I have a strong belief that, for India, at the stage at which we are,
more transparency is required for better governance,
for better democracy, for reducing corruption,
a whole gamut of things.
And, therefore, my decisions tend to interpret the exemptions narrowly.
My default position is
right to information is a fundamental right of citizens.
So before you deny a fundamental right,
you've got to have strong reasons for denying that.
The Commission feels that such data should
actually be available every month.
In, I would say, 97 to 98 percent of the cases I take a decision immediately.
Last year, in fact, I disposed 5,900.
If one worked a little more on the process,
I think it's possible to raise this figure to about 7 or 8,000 per year.
I think any commissioner
should be holding hearings for around 5 hours a day.
which is not happening in most cases.
Two,
organizing yourself a little systematically,
and working only digitally
helps a great deal.
For a number of cases,
I have got certain templates.
Primarily this is based on designing a work system,
which was explained to every staff member in the office,
ensuring that everybody, including the peon, could do virtually all jobs.
I am sure it can be replicated
in India and in other countries.
In fact, not just that. I believe
what I have done
is just the beginning.