The RTI Law: 16 Years On, Still a Contested Space by Nikhil Dey and Aruna Roy
The opposition to RTI comes from an insidious criticism about who uses the RTI for what. One of the allegations loosely made about RTI users is that they are ‘mostly blackmailers’. While it is true that some blackmailers have found the RTI to be a means by which they can effectively conduct their practice, it is, in fact, a battle between two thieves. Handled effectively, it could lead to an exposé of both.
Like all movements, the RTI cannot speak for each individual, but there can be little doubt that the RTI is a non-violent method of trying to establish the truth, and using the truth to fight injustice. More importantly, however, it can be controlled through proactive disclosure in the RTI Act itself.
The demand for the RTI began with an agitation of workers and peasants for wage entitlement and the right to see their muster rolls (work records) in central Rajasthan in the early 1990s.
Justices Shah, Sen, and Muralidharan recognised the wide and deep relationship of the Right to Information with the fundamental rights in their Delhi high court judgment. The order said that the peasants and workers of Rajasthan had through their struggle for the Right to Information, raised fundamental questions of equality, social justice, and the right to life, and therefore, along with freedom of expression under Article 19 of the Indian constitution, the RTI should be seen as a manifestation of the right to life under Article 21, and the right to equality under Article 14.