Right to Information Act

The Right to Information act is a law enacted by the Parliament of India access to records of the Central Government and State Governments. The Act applies to all States and Union Territories of India, except the State of Jammu and Kashmir - which is covered under a State-level law.

This law was passed by Parliament on 15 June 2005 and came fully into force on 13 October 2005 . Information disclosure in India was hitherto restricted by the Official Secrets Act 1923 and various other special laws, which the new RTI Act now relaxes.

State-level laws

The RTI Laws were first successfully enacted by the state governments of — Tamil Nadu (1997)Goa (1997), Rajasthan (2000), Karnataka (2000), Delhi (2001), Maharashtra (2002), Madhya Pradesh (2003), Assam (2002) and Jammu and Kashmir (2004). The Maharashtra and Delhi State level enactments are considered to have been the most widely used. The Delhi RTI Act is still in force. Jammu & Kashmir, has its own Right to Information Act of 2009, the successor to the repealed J&K Right to Information Act, 2004 and its 2008 amendment.

           Freedom of Information Act

Passage of a national level law, however, proved to be a difficult task. Given the experience of state governments in passing practicable legislation, the Central Government appointed a working group under H. D. Shourie and assigned it the task of drafting legislation. The Shourie draft, in an extremely diluted form, was the basis for the Freedom of Information Bill, 2000 which eventually became law under the Freedom of Information Act, 2002

Information

The Act specifies that citizens have a right to:

• request any information (as defined).
• take copies of documents.
• inspect documents, works and records.
• take certified samples of materials of work.
• obtain information in form of printouts, diskettes, floppies, tapes, video cassettes 'or in any other electronic mode' or through printouts.