Last June, the Central Information Commission ruled that political parties aided by the government are subject to the Right to Information Act. Nine months later, not one of the six national political parties has complied with the requirements of the ruling. When the CIC asked them to explain this by March 7, they ignored the notice.
Not only have they failed to appoint public information officers to attend to RTI queries, they have also refused to explain their defiance to the CIC.
The CIC had argued that several political parties were being heavily aided by the government in the form of subsidised land for party offices and, in Delhi, for housing. They are also substantially aided by the taxpayer by receiving free airtime on All India Radio and Doordarshan before elections.
As a consequence, the "people of India must know the source of expenditure incurred by political parties and by the candidates in the process of election", the CIC said.
The parties covered by the ruling are the Bhartiya Janata Party, the Indian National Congress, the Communist Party of India, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Nationalist Congress Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.
All six parties rejected the ruling and the government drafted a law to override it. But it did not manage to pass the bill. As a result, the parties are legally bound to comply with the ruling. Since they have refused to comply with the ruling, RTI activist Subhash Chandra Agarwal, one of the petitioners who asked the CIC to bring political parties under the purview of the Act, says that these six organisations should be debarred.
“If a party uses public funds and enjoys tax exemptions, why should it not be brought under the RTI Act?” Agarwal demanded.
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a senior spokesperson of the Congress party said, “There is consensus among political parties that by law, they are not under the purview of the RTI. We share our accounts only with the Election Commission, so the CIC can file a complaint against us if it wants to, but we will contest it.”
The petitioners in the case argued that political parties are public authorities as they are registered with the Election Commission, which is a constitutional body established through The Representation of The People Act, 1951. They mainly wanted to know the names, addresses and amounts of donations the parties were receiving. Four months after the information commission ruling, in October 2013, the Supreme Court had ruled that non-government organisations that are substantially funded by the government will be subject to the Right to Information Act.
SR Pillai, a spokesperson and politbureau member of the CPI (M), does not agree that the parties are defying the law by not enforcing the ruling. “The CIC’s order is not in conformity with the provisions of the law," he claimed. "The Supreme Court once passed an order that parties cannot be called political authorities as defined by the RTI.” The CPI (M), he said, has now asked the CIC to grant it six more months to file an explanation.
In other words, one of the urgent tasks the next government is likely to take up is amending the RTI Act so that the functioning and financing of political parties remains opaque.
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Not only have they failed to appoint public information officers to attend to RTI queries, they have also refused to explain their defiance to the CIC.
The CIC had argued that several political parties were being heavily aided by the government in the form of subsidised land for party offices and, in Delhi, for housing. They are also substantially aided by the taxpayer by receiving free airtime on All India Radio and Doordarshan before elections.
As a consequence, the "people of India must know the source of expenditure incurred by political parties and by the candidates in the process of election", the CIC said.
The parties covered by the ruling are the Bhartiya Janata Party, the Indian National Congress, the Communist Party of India, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Nationalist Congress Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.
All six parties rejected the ruling and the government drafted a law to override it. But it did not manage to pass the bill. As a result, the parties are legally bound to comply with the ruling. Since they have refused to comply with the ruling, RTI activist Subhash Chandra Agarwal, one of the petitioners who asked the CIC to bring political parties under the purview of the Act, says that these six organisations should be debarred.
“If a party uses public funds and enjoys tax exemptions, why should it not be brought under the RTI Act?” Agarwal demanded.
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a senior spokesperson of the Congress party said, “There is consensus among political parties that by law, they are not under the purview of the RTI. We share our accounts only with the Election Commission, so the CIC can file a complaint against us if it wants to, but we will contest it.”
The petitioners in the case argued that political parties are public authorities as they are registered with the Election Commission, which is a constitutional body established through The Representation of The People Act, 1951. They mainly wanted to know the names, addresses and amounts of donations the parties were receiving. Four months after the information commission ruling, in October 2013, the Supreme Court had ruled that non-government organisations that are substantially funded by the government will be subject to the Right to Information Act.
SR Pillai, a spokesperson and politbureau member of the CPI (M), does not agree that the parties are defying the law by not enforcing the ruling. “The CIC’s order is not in conformity with the provisions of the law," he claimed. "The Supreme Court once passed an order that parties cannot be called political authorities as defined by the RTI.” The CPI (M), he said, has now asked the CIC to grant it six more months to file an explanation.
In other words, one of the urgent tasks the next government is likely to take up is amending the RTI Act so that the functioning and financing of political parties remains opaque.
