From that day, the island nation’s 21 million citizens can exercise their legal right to public information held by various layers and arms of government.
One month is too soon to know how this law is changing a society that has never been able to question their rulers – monarchs, colonials or elected governments – for 25 centuries. But early signs are encouraging.
Sri Lanka’s 22-year advocacy for RTI was led by journalists, lawyers, civil society activists and a few progressive politicians. If it wasn’t a very grassroots campaign, ordinary citizens are beginning to seize the opportunity now.
RTI can be assessed from its ‘supply side’ as well as the ‘demand side’. States are primarily responsible for supplying it, i.e. ensuring that all public authorities are prepared and able to respond to information requests. The demand side is left for citizens, who may act as individuals or in groups.
In Sri Lanka, both these sides are getting into speed, but it still is a bumpy road.
Cartoon by Gihan de Chickera, Daily Mirror
During February, we noticed uneven levels of RTI preparedness across the 52 government ministries, 82 departments, 386 state corporations and hundreds of other ‘public authorities’ covered by the RTI Act. After a six month preparatory phase, some institutions were ready to process citizen requests from Day One. But many were still confused, and a few even turned away early applicants.
Such teething problems are not surprising — turning the big ship of government takes time and effort. We can only hope that all public authorities, across central, provincial and local government, will soon be ready to deal with citizen information requests efficiently and courteously.
Some, like the independent Election Commission, have already set a standard for this by processing an early request for audited financial reports of all registered political parties for the past five years.
On the demand side, citizens from all walks of life have shown considerable enthusiasm. By late February, according to Dr Ranga Kalansooriya, Director General of the Department of Information, more than 1,500 citizen RTI requests had been received. How many of these requests will ultimately succeed, we have to wait and see.
Reports in the media and social media indicate that the early RTI requests cover a wide range of matters linked to private grievances or public interest.
Under the RTI law, public authorities can’t play hide and seek with citizens. They must provide written answers in 14 days, or seek an extension of another 21 days.
To improve their chances and avoid hassle, citizens should ask their questions as precisely as possible, and know the right public authority to lodge their requests. Civil society groups can train citizens on this, even as they file RTI requests of their own.
That too is happening, with trade unions, professional bodies and other NGOs making RTI requests in the public interest. Some of these ask inconvenient yet necessary questions, for example on key political leaders’ asset declarations, and an official assessment of the civil war’s human and property damage (done in 2013).
Politicians and officials are used to dodging such queries under various pretexts, but the right use of RTI law by determined citizens can press them to open up – or else.
The Right to Information Commission will play a decisive role in ensuring the law’s proper implementation. “These are early days for the Commission which is still operating in an interim capacity with a skeletal staff from temporary premises,” it said in a media statement on February 10.
The real proof of RTI – also a fundamental right added to Constitution in 2015 – will be in how much citizens use it to hold government accountable and to solve their pressing problems. Watch this space.
Science writer and media researcher Nalaka Gunawardene is active on Twitter as @NalakaG. Views in this post are his own.
One by one, Sri Lanka public agencies are displaying their RTI officer details as required by law. Example: http://www.pucsl.gov.lk saved on 24 Feb 2017
RTI in Sri Lanka – Nalaka Gunawardene op-ed published in IFJ South Asia blog, 14 July 2016
RTI in Sri Lanka:
It took 22 years, and journey continues
By Nalaka Gunawardene
Sri Lanka’s Parliament debated the Right to Information (RTI) bill for two days (23 – 24 June 2016) before adopting it into law. No member opposed it, although some amendments were done during the debate.
If that sounds like an easy passage, it was preceded by over two decades of advocacy with various false starts and setbacks. A large number of Lankans and a few supportive foreigners share the credit for Sri Lanka becoming the 108th country in the world to have its own RTI (or freedom of information) law.
How we reached this point is a case study of campaigning for policy change and law reform in a developing country with an imperfect democracy. The journey deserves greater documentation and analysis, but here I want to look at the key strategies, promoters and enablers.
The story began with the change of government in Parliamentary elections of August 1994. The newly elected People’s Alliance (PA) government formulated a media policy that included a commitment to people’s right to know.
But the first clear articulation of RTI came in May 1996, from an expert committee appointed by the media minister to advise on reforming laws affecting media freedom and freedom of expression. The committee, headed by eminent lawyer R K W Goonesekere (and thus known as the Goonesekere Committee) recommended many reforms – including a constitutional guarantee of RTI.
Sadly, that government soon lost its zeal for reforms, but some ideas in that report caught on. Chief among them was RTI, which soon attracted the advocacy of some journalists, academics and lawyers. And even a few progressive politicians.
Different players approached the RTI advocacy challenge in their own ways — there was no single campaign or coordinated action. Some spread the idea through media and civil society networks, inspiring the ‘demand side’ of RTI. Others lobbied legislators and helped draft laws — hoping to trigger the ‘supply side’. A few public intellectuals helpfully cheered from the sidelines.
Typical policy development in Sri Lanka is neither consultative nor transparent. In such a setting, all that RTI promoters could do was to keep raising it at every available opportunity, so it slowly gathered momentum.
For example, the Colombo Declaration on Media Freedom and Social Responsibility – issued by the country’s leading media organisations in 1998 – made a clear and strong case for RTI. It said, “The Official Secrets Act which defines official secrets vaguely and broadly should be repealed and a Freedom of Information Act be enacted where disclosure of information will be the norm and secrecy the exception.”
That almost happened in 2002-3, when a collaboratively drafted RTI law received Cabinet approval. But an expedient President dissolved Parliament prematurely, and the pro-RTI government did not win the ensuing election.
RTI had no chance whatsoever during the authoritarian rule of Mahinda Rajapaksa from 2005 to 2014. Separate attempts to introduce RTI laws by a Minister of Justice and an opposition Parliamentarian (now Speaker of Parliament) were shot down. If anyone wanted information, the former President once told newspaper editors, they could just ask him…
His unexpected election defeat in January 2015 finally paved the way for RTI, which was an election pledge of the common opposition. Four months later, the new government added RTI to the Constitution’s fundamental rights. The new RTI Act now creates a mechanism for citizens to exercise that right.
Meanwhile, there is a convergence of related ideas like open government (Sri Lanka became first South Asian country to join Open Government Partnership in 2015) and open data – the proactive disclosure of public data in digital formats.
These new advocacy fronts can learn from how a few dozen public spirited individuals kept the RTI flames alive, sometimes through bleak periods. Some pioneers did not live to see their aspiration become reality.
Our RTI challenges are far from over. We now face the daunting task of implementing the new law. RTI calls for a complete reorientation of government. Proper implementation requires political will, administrative support and sufficient funds. We also need vigilance by civil society and the media to guard against the whole process becoming mired in too much red tape.
RTI is a continuing journey. We have just passed a key milestone.
Science writer and columnist Nalaka Gunawardene has long chronicled Sri Lanka’s information society and media development issues. He tweets at @NalakaG.
I was interviewed by BBC Sinhala in London on 21 June 2016, on the eve of Sri Lanka’s Parliament passing the long-waited Right to Information law. In this interview with BBC’s Saroj Pathirana, I look at the journey so far (it took over 2o years to get this law adopted) and challenges than remain.
Chief among the challenges from now on: reorienting all state structures to be open and info-sharing rather than closed and secretive (default mode until now); raising public awareness on the provisions and benefits of RTI law (including debunking of myths and misconceptions); and learning to be a more information-literate society as a whole.
BBC Sinhala home page on 27 June 2016, featuring Nalaka Gunawardene interview on Right to Information in Sri Lanka
Cartoon by Awantha Artigala, Daily Mirror newspaper Sri Lanka
Right to Information: A New Journey Begins Now!
By Nalaka Gunawardene
On 24 June 2016, Sri Lanka’s Parliament unanimously adopted the Right to Information (RTI) law.
This marks the culmination of over two decades of advocacy by civil society groups and journalists. It also fulfills a key promise of the yahapalana government.
Passing the law has been no easy task, as it went through a year of drafting, judicial review by Supreme Court, and considerable political scrutiny. The government and other political parties in Parliament – who rarely agree on anything – came together to pass the law without a vote.
However, our challenges are far from over. Now begins the daunting task of implementing the new law. RTI calls for a complete reorientation of government in how it handles information and promotes openness. This is unfamiliar ground.
As one skeptical citizen, Harindra Dassanayake (@HarindraBD) said on Twitter within hours of the law passing: “Lanka as many good laws, with hopeless or zero impact. Hope RTI [would] be different. It’s time to act and not celebrate.”
Indeed, there is much to do. The law’s adoption is only a fresh start. Proper implementation requires political will, administrative support and sufficient public funds.
We would also need on-going monitoring by civil society groups and the media to guard against the whole process becoming mired in too much red tape.
Late comers, quick learners?
With the new law, Sri Lanka becomes the 108th country in the world to have introduced RTI laws, also known as freedom of information laws.
That leaves only Bhutan in South Asia without a national RTI law, according to Venkatesh Nayak, Programme Coordinator with the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) in New Delhi.
Nayak, a noted RTI expert and activist, says that countries without RTI laws are becoming a smaller and smaller minority on the planet.
He adds: “But for the long drawn ethnic conflict, Sri Lanka would have been the second country in South Asia to enact a national RTI law if efforts made in 2003-4 had reached fruition.”
In the event, Sri Lanka took the belated first step in April 2015, when the 19th Amendment to the Constitution made the right to information a fundamental right. The RTI Act puts in place the administrative arrangement to enable citizens can exercise that right.
Sri Lanka is certainly a late comer to the global RTI community, but we can exploit this to our advantage. Our neighbours and others countries have so much experience in this respect that can help us in implementation.
For example, RTI has emerged such a powerful tool in the hands of Indian citizens since the national law came into effect in 2005. So much so that it is now become a verb (as in “We will RTI this information” when confronted with a problem).
Across India, young schoolchildren and grandmothers with no formal education are using RTI requests to solve local level problems – from overdue scholarship payments to restoring suspended rural bus services.
Meanwhile in Bangladesh, which adopted its RTI law in 2009, citizens and NGOs are creatively using public information to combat poverty and counter corruption.
RTI has transformed Indian society within a decade
RTI needs imagination
What transformative impacts can the RTI law have on Lankan society, politics and governance? The answer is in everybody’s hands.
Unlike most other laws, RTI is one for citizens to seize and use. That, in turn, requires a commitment to the public interest, plus plenty of imagination and tenacity.
When the new Act comes into effect six months from now, any citizen of any age should be able to seek and receive information held with a public authority at central, provincial or local levels.
The law covers all organs of the State – Parliament, Executive (President and Cabinet) and the Judiciary. This includes the police and public sector corporations, local government bodies, as well as private entities carrying out public functions or providing public services under contract or license from local authorities (to the extent such work is concerned).
To be sure, the law has some exemptions when the right of access to information may be denied on legitimate grounds such as protecting the privacy of individuals, safeguarding national security and preventing the premature release of vital economic data (e.g. exchange rates, regulation of banking and taxation). These are common to RTI laws the world over.
Some are not happy with the extent of exemptions. But in my view, we should focus on so much information that now becomes our right to ask for — and receive within 21 days or less.
On the part of public authorities, they will no longer be allowed to release information as and when they wish. RTI law defines how it must be done and failure to do so has consequences for public officials.
Citizens, on their part, must find sufficient purpose and focus in information they can demand and receive. RTI is not a mere political slogan, but a practical tool for solving problems.
Problem solving
For example, how does our local body spend our tax money? On what basis are Samurdhi beneficiaries selected? Or how are government jobs given to some and not others?
RTI will prise open the hitherto closely guarded ‘reservoirs’ of information.
A five member RTI Commission appointed by the President — on the recommendations of the Constitutional Council — will monitor and process and investigate citizen complaints and appeals. The Commission’s decisions can also be challenged before the Court of Appeal.
All this concerns the ‘supply side’ of public information, which is surely going to be enhanced. But what about the demand side? Are we ready for active citizenship armed with more information?
To draw an analogy from water management, opening sluice gates of a water reservoir can benefit only if the downstream systems are in place and the users are ready. With both water and information, recipients need to know how to make the best use of what comes through.
In the coming weeks and months, much needs to be done to ensure RTI readiness among public officials, and RTI awareness among the public.
Finally, citizens can look back at govt…do we know how?
Bigger Picture
As we get busy with the nitty-gritty operational details, let us not lose sight of the bigger picture. RTI signifies unleashing a new potential, and a major change in the status quo.
First, we must shake off a historical legacy of governments not being open or accountable to citizens. For over 2,000 years of monarchy, over 400 years of colonial rule and 67 years of self-rule since independence, all our governments have restricted public information – even mundane ones unrelated to any security or sensitive issues.
The ‘default setting’ in most government agencies is to deny and restrict information. To change this, both public servants and citizens will need a paradigm shift in their minds.
As long-standing champions of RTI, Lankan media and civil society must now switch roles. While benefiting from RTI themselves, they can nurture the newly promised openness in every sphere of public life. They can show, inspire and equip other citizens how best to make use of it.
However, RTI is not just a piece of law or changing how governments share public information. At its most basic, RTI is a collective state of mind. With its adoption, our society can start moving along a more open, informed and inquisitive pathway.
Science writer and columnist Nalaka Gunawardene has long chronicled the rise of Sri Lanka’s information society. He tweets at @NalakaG
[Main points I made in a TV news interview with national broadcaster Rupavahini on 25 June 2016, within 24 hours of Sri Lanka’s Parliament passing the Right to Information law.]
Nalaka Gunawardene in Rupavahini interview on Sri Lanka’s new Right to Information RTI Law, 25 June 2016
In this week’s Ravaya column (appearing in issue of 17 January 2016), I critique the public communications practices President Maithripala Sirisena of Sri Lanka – and call for better listening and more engagement by the head of state.
I point out that Sirisena is in danger of overexposure in the mainstream media, which I call the ‘Premadasa Syndrome’ (as this bad practice was started by President R Premadasa who was in office from 1988 to May 1993). I argue that citizens don’t need to be force-fed a daily dose of presidential activities on prime time news or in the next day’s newspapers. If public documentation is needed, use the official website.
Like other politicians in Sri Lanka, Sirisena uses key social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter to simply disseminate his speeches, messages and photos. But his official website has no space for citizens to comment. That is old school broadcasting, not engaging.
This apparent aloofness, and the fact that he has not done a single Twitter/Facebook Q&A session before or after the election, detracts from his image as a consultative political leader.
On the whole, I would far prefer to see a more engaged (yet far less preachy!) presidency. It would be great to have our First Citizen using mainstream media as well as new media platforms to have regular conversations with the rest of us citizens on matters of public interest. A growing number of modern democratic rulers prefer informal citizen engagement without protocol or pomposity. President Sirisena is not yet among them.
After many years of advocacy by civil society groups and journalists, Sri Lanka is set to soon adopt a law guaranteeing citizens’ Right to Information (RTI, also known as freedom of information laws in some countries). With that, we will join over 100 other countries that have introduced such progressive laws.
The first step is already taken. The 19th Amendment to the Constitution, passed in Parliament in April 2015, made the right to information a fundamental right. The Right to Information Act is meant to institutionalize the arrangement – i.e. put in place the administrative arrangement where a citizen can seek and receive public information.
RTI signifies unleashing a new potential, and a major change in status quo. First, we need to shake off a long historical legacy of governments not being open or accountable to citizens.
In this week’s Ravaya column, (appearing in issue of 22 Nov 2015), I explore how RTI can gradually lead to open government. I also introduce the 9 key principles of RTI.
L to R – Wijayananda Jayaweera, Gamini Viyangoda, Nalaka Gunawardene, Shan Wijetunge. At Right to Information public forum on 17 Nov 2015 in Colombo. Photo by Sampath Samarakoon
Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) held a Public Forum on the Right to Information in Colombo on 17 November 2015. I was one of three panelists, along with Wijayananda Jayaweera and Gamini Viyangoda. The panel was moderated by TISL’s Shan Wijetunge.
RTI Public Forum on 17 Nov 2015
The meeting was conducted in Sinhala. After the event, a journalist from an English language newspaper asked for a summary of my remarks in English, so I wrote this up.
L to R – Wijayananda Jayaweera, Gamini Viyangoda, Nalaka Gunawardene, Shan Wijetunge. At Right to Information public forum on 17 Nov 2015 in Colombo. Photo by Sampath Samarakoon
Summary of remarks made at Right to Information Public Forum held in Colombo on 17 Nov 2015
By Nalaka Gunawardene
Science writer, columnist and new media researcher
After many years of advocacy by civil society groups and journalists, Sri Lanka is set to soon adopt a law guaranteeing citizens’ Right to Information (RTI, also known as freedom of information laws in some countries). With that, we will join over 100 other countries that have introduced such progressive laws.
The first step is already taken. The 19th Amendment to the Constitution, passed in Parliament in April 2015, made the right to information a fundamental right.
The Right to Information Act is meant to institutionalize the arrangement – i.e. put in place the administrative arrangement where a citizen can seek and receive public information.
Some have been critical of the current draft of the RTI Bill as it falls short of the ideal. But in my view, adopting even an imperfect RTI law would be progress.
But we need to see the law’s adoption as only the beginning of a long journey. Proper implementation will require adequate political will, administrative support and sufficient public funds. We would also need sustained monitoring by civil society groups and media to guard against the whole process becoming mired in too much red tape.
RTI signifies unleashing a new potential, and a major change in status quo. First, we need to shake off a long historical legacy of governments not being open or accountable to citizens.
For over 2,000 years of monarchy, over 400 years of colonial rule and 67 years of self-rule since independence, all our governments have restricted public information – even mundane ones unrelated to any security or sensitive issues.
Thus, the ‘default setting’ in most government agencies seems to be to deny and restrict information. When this finally changes, both public servants and citizens will need to adjust.
Information custodians can no longer release selectively, or demand petty bribes for doing so. Citizens, on their part, must find purpose and focus in information they can demand and receive. RTI is not a mere political slogan.
To draw an analogy from water management, opening sluice gates of a water reservoir can benefit only if the downstream systems are in place and the users are ready. With both water and information, recipients need to know how to make the best use of what comes through.
As long-standing champions of RTI, Lankan media and civil society must now switch roles. While benefiting from RTI themselves, they can nurture the newly promised openness in every sphere of public life. They can show, inspire and equip other citizens how best to make use of it.
However, RTI is not just a piece of law or changing how governments share public information. At its most basic, RTI is a collective state of mind. With its adoption, a society can start moving along a more open, informed and inquisitive pathway.
Better management of public information – which covers its proper gathering, storing, analysing and disseminating – should come into sharper focus with RTI.
In a related development, Sri Lanka has just joined an international, multilateral initiative called the Open Government Partnership (OGP). It is the first country in South Asia to do so.
OGP is a global effort “to make governments better”. It aims to secure firm commitments from governments to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance. OGP was launched in September 2011, and since then, the partnership has grown to 69 countries representing over a third of the world’s population.
To join OGP, a country must meet minimum eligibility criteria. These cover the timely publication of essential budget documents forms the basic building blocks of budget accountability; RTI guaranteed by law; rules that require public disclosure of income and assets for elected and senior public officials; and openness to citizen participation and engagement in policymaking and governance, including basic protections for civil liberties.
With its impending RTI law, Sri Lanka became eligible to join OGP. Its membership was confirmed at the recent OGP Conference held in Mexico City in late October 2015, where Sri Lanka endorsed the Open Government Declaration committing “to foster a global culture of open government that empowers and delivers for citizens, and advances the ideals of open and participatory 21st century government.”
In his speech in Mexico City, Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe said: “Our people have proven that citizens will and should be at the heart of the destiny of any country. Importantly, the events this year reaffirm the resilience of our democracy and make it apparent that it is the people that demand an ‘open government’ for my country.”
Now the Yahapalana Government must walk this lofty talk.
OGP member countries are required to prepare a National Action Plan (NAP) which should be done collaboratively by the government and civil society. Such plans should cover a two-year period and consist of a set of commitments that advance transparency, accountability, participation and/or technological innovation.
The bottomline with Right to Information is this. RTI is not simply a legal or technocratic solution. It is not a quick fix to all problems that affect our society. But it heralds a new way of thinking – a paradigm shift, if you like – that would make our government more open, and our society more focused on using information and data to make our lives better.
Part of the audience at RTI Public Forum on 17 Nov 2015 in ColomboWriter and activist Gamini Viyangoda speaks at RTI Public Forum on 17 Nov 2015
Today, I gave the opening speech at an introductory seminar on ‘open data’ held at the Sri Lanka Press Institute, Colombo, on 15 Oct 2015.
Organised by InterNews and Transparency International Sri Lanka, the seminar explored the concepts of ‘open data’ and ‘big data’ and discussed that role civil society, media and technologists can play in advocating to government to open up its data, enabling a culture of transparency and open government.
An Open Dialogue on Open Data – 15 Oct 2015 Coloombo – L to R – Sriganesh Lokanathan, Nalaka Gunawardene, Sanjana Hattotuwa [Photo by Sam de Silva]My premise was that while the proliferation of digital tools and growth of web-based data storage (the cloud) opens up new possibilities for information generation and sharing, South Asian societies need to tackle institutional and cultural factors before democratised and digital data can really transform governance and development. Our countries must adopt more inclusive policies and practices for public sharing of scientific and other public data.
This resonates with a call by the United Nations for a ‘data revolution for development’. I cited the UN Secretary-General’s Independent Expert Advisory Group on a Data Revolution for Sustainable Development (IEAG) highlighted this in a report titled A World That Counts: Mobilising The Data Revolution for Sustainable Development (Nov 2014).
A World that Counts…
I also referred to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that were adopted by member states of the UN at a heads of state level summit in New York on 25-27 September 2015. Underpinning all 17 SDGs is an explicit recognition of the value of data for development — to better inform decisions, and to better monitor progress.
Sri Lanka’s President Maithripala Sirisena addressed the Summit, and officially committed Sri Lanka to the SDGs. I argue that implicit in that commitment is a recognition of data for development and open data policies. We now need to ask our government to introduce a government-wide policy on data collection, storage and sharing. In short, it must open up!
This was my open call to the President to open up:
Open Your Govt’s Data, Mr President! Hope you don’t give us HAL’s famous answer…
Sri Lanka has taken tentative steps towards open data. In 2013, the Open Data initiative of Government started making some official datasets freely available online. It focuses on machine-readable (well-structured and open) datasets.
I quoted from my own recent op-ed published in Daily Mirror broadsheet newspaper:
After many years of advocacy by civil society, Sri Lanka will soon adopt a law that guarantees citizens’ Right to Information (RTI). It has recently been added to the Constitution as a fundamental right.
Passing the RTI law is only a beginning — institutionalising it requires much effort, considerable funds, and continued vigilance on civil society’s part.
RTI is Coming: Are We Ready? My question to Lankan civil society and media
As champions of RTI, media and civil society must now switch roles, I said. While benefiting from RTI themselves, they can nurture the newly promised openness in every sphere, showing citizens how best to make use of it. Reorienting our public institutions to a new culture of openness and information sharing will be an essential step.
After many years of advocacy by civil society, Sri Lanka is set to adopt a law that guarantees citizens’ Right to Information (RTI). With that, we will at last catch up with nearly 100 countries that have introduced such progressive laws.
Better late than never — but passing the law is only a beginning. Institutionalising it requires effort and funds. Continued vigilance is needed on civil society’s part to guard against the process becoming mired in red tape.
RTI signifies unleashing a new potential. To draw an analogy from water management, opening a ‘sluice’ does not by itself mean much unless the downstream systems are in place. In both cases, the recipients need to know how to make the best use of what comes through.
Journey so far
Why is RTI such a big deal?
Its basis is that in democracies, the public have every right to know what is being done in their name by those entrusted with governance.
RTI is the right to access and obtain information from public officials. This right serves several purposes: improve public participation in policy making; promote transparency and accountability in government; and minimise wastage and corruption of state resources by public officials.
RTI and freedom of information are used interchangeably, but there is an important distinction between the two.
According to lawyer Gehan Gunatilleke, who recently wrote a book on the subject (published by Sri Lanka Press Institute, 2014), freedom of information implies a citizen’s freedom to access and receive public information on request. In such a situation, the government should not violate that freedom by restricting access. RTI goes further, and implies that information is an inherent right of the people. Governments are duty-bound to provide such information.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted at the United Nations in 1948, recognised the right to seek, impart and receive information as part the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression (Article 19).
Article 19 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights
RTI does not mean opening up everything. Sensitive information – related to national security, for example – is excluded. The challenge is to strike a healthy balance between full transparency and a few justified exemptions.
Indian experience
In Asia, India was a frontrunner in developing RTI laws. The campaign for RTI started in the 1990s with a grassroots movement driven by social activists and rural groups. They saw its clear value to counter the growing misuse of authority and public funds by local officials.
State level RTI laws were adopted in Tamil Nadu (1997), Goa (1997), Rajasthan (2000), Delhi (2001) and Maharashtra (2002). The national law came into effect in October 2005 after a decade of agitation.
Under the Indian law, citizens can request information from any ‘public authority’ within 30 days. It covers all branches of government — executive, legislature and judiciary – as well as institutions and statutory bodies set up by an act of national Parliament or a state legislature. Even non-governmental organisations, if they receive significant amounts of government funds, are covered.
The act required all public authorities to appoint a public information officer (PIO) to handle RTI requests. It also mandated computerizing of public records so that certain categories of information are proactively published online, enabling interested citizens to just look it up.
Since the RTI law was introduced, India has seen an improvement in governance, dissemination of information and involvement of civil society in the governance process, says Dr Rajesh Tandon, founder and head of the Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), a voluntary organisation providing support to grassroots initiatives.
At the same time, Tandon points out that some challenges remain at implementation level. Certain states in India have been more active in creating a culture of information sharing and open government, he told me in a television interview in mid 2014.
As Indians found out, it isn’t easy to shake off centuries of misplaced state secrecy and mistrust in the public. “Old rules and procedures continue to co-exist as new laws and methods are invented. Official Secrecy Act and Right to Information Act co-exist, just as written precedent and e-governance co-exist,” says Tandon (watch our full interview: https://vimeo.com/118544161).
New challenges
In Sri Lanka, civil society groups and journalists’ organisations were at the forefront advocating RTI. Groups like Transparency International and Sri Lanka Press Institute (SLPI) have been lobbying, training and raising awareness on the societal value of this right.
However, RTI is not only for journalists or social activists. It is a right for all citizens living in modern societies where their well-being – sometimes even survival – depends on knowing critical information. Ignorance may have been bliss once upon a time, but it is not recommended for the 21st century.
Reorienting the public institutions to a new culture of openness and sharing will be an essential step. Undoing decades of habits will take effort.
Asanga Welikala, a legal scholar now with the Edinburgh Law School, said in a tweet that we need a moratorium of ‘at least two years’ before RTI law comes into force – so as to train officials and make all government procedures compliant.
He also says the Information Commission must have a proper budget for promotion and public awareness of the new Act, rights and procedures. For example, how to ensure citizen information requests can be accommodated equally in both official languages and the link language?
As champions of RTI, media and civil society must now switch roles. While benefiting from it themselves, they can nurture the newly promised openness in every sphere, showing citizens how best to make use of it.
Public information can exist in many forms today – ranging from minutes of meetings, budget allocation and expense records, and scientifically gathered information such as census data, or trade statistics. These may be stored on paper, tape or – increasingly – in digital formats.
In recent years, with digital technologies the volume of specialised data held by governments has risen phenomenally. Both the data custodians and public today need higher levels of information literacy to navigate through this torrent.
The good news: the web makes it easier to store and share information. ‘Open Data’ means that certain data should be freely available to everyone to use and republish as they wish, without restrictions from copyright, patents or other mechanisms of control.
The open data approach is especially applied to scientific data and government data. But the debate is far from settled: while there are many strong arguments for opening up, some are concerned about potential misuses. Guidelines are still evolving.
A key attribute of open data is its usability. Each country needs to adopt information gathering and data storage standards, so as to minimize users facing problems that arise with the use of different devices, systems and measuring systems.
Some public data custodians in South Asia still release vast amounts of data in hard copy (paper-based) form. For example, India’s Marine Fisherfolk Census of 2010 had results running into thousands of pages of data tables – they were only released on paper. That made further analysis impossible. Undaunted, a fishers’ collective mobilised some tech-savvy volunteers to create computerised spreadsheet databases.
Like many other elements of good governance, RTI’s effectiveness depends on imagination, innovation and persistence on the part of citizens. Its best results will accrue in a society and political culture where evidence and analysis are trusted. Sri Lanka is not there yet.
![An Open Dialogue on Open Data - 15 Oct 2015 Coloombo - L to R - Sriganesh Lokanathan, Nalaka Gunawardene, Sanjana Hattotuwa [Photo by Sam de Silva]](https://movingimages.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/an-open-dialogue-on-open-data-15-oct-2015-coloombo-l-to-r-sriganesh-lokanathan-nalaka-gunawardene-sanjana-hattotuwa.jpg)
Open Minds! (formerly: Moving Images blog) 