Indian Political Parties to come under RTI Act -Monday June 3,2013

      

Setting a new bench mark in transparency in politics, the CIC on Monday June 3,2013 held political parties are answerable under the Right to Information Act.

A full bench of the commission comprising chief information commissioner Satyananda Mishra and information commissioner M L Sharma and Annapurna Dixit held six parties — INC, BJP, CPM, CPI, NCP and BSP — to whom RTI queries were directed, fulfill the criteria of being public authorities under the Right to Information Act.

 
    

The CIC has held today that political parties are "public authorities", have a "public character" and are "substantially funded by the government.The bench said that income tax exemptions granted to the parties and free air time on All India Radio and Doordarshan at the time of elections, also amount to indirect financing from the government.

The presidents, general secretaries of these parties are hereby directed to designate CPIOs and appellate authorities at their headquarters in six weeks. The CPIOs so appointed will respond to the RTI applications extracted in this order in four weeks time," the bench directed.

The bench also directed them to comply with the provisions of mandatory proactive disclosures clauses given under the RTI ACT and put those details on their websites.

Most parties are vehemently opposed to such a move and have argued that they are not government funded and are not public authorities and so should not be brought under the RTI Act