THE HINDU Editorial Vocabulary - July 23, 2018 - Topic 2
Sunlight and shadow: on
amendments to the RTI Act
As a law that empowers the citizen, the Right to Information Act, 2005
quickly struck root in a country saddled with the colonial legacy of secretive
government. The move by the NDA government to amend the far-sighted law aims at
eroding the independence of the Information Commissions at the national level
and in the States. The proposed amendments show that the Central government
seeks control over the tenure, salary and allowances of the Chief Information
Commissioner and Information Commissioners at the Centre, and the State Chief
Information Commissioners.
Such a change would eliminate the parity they
currently have with the Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioners
and, therefore, equivalence with a judge of the Supreme Court in matters of
pay, allowances and conditions of service. The Centre will also fix the terms
for State Information Commissioners. This is an ill-advised move and should be
junked without standing on prestige. If at all, the law needs to be amended
only to bring about full compliance by government departments and agencies that
receive substantial funding from the exchequer, and to extend its scope to more
institutions that have an influence on official policy. The Supreme Court has
held the right to information as being integral to the right to free expression
under Article 19(1)(a); weakening the transparency law would negate that
guarantee.
In its rationale for the amendments, the Centre
has maintained that unlike the EC, Information Commissions are not
constitutional bodies but mere statutory creations under the law. This is a
narrow view, betraying an anxiety to tighten the hold of the administration on
the Commissions, which even now get little official support to fill vacancies
and improve efficiency. A recent public interest petition filed in the Supreme Court
by the National Campaign for People’s Right to Information pointed out that the
Central Information Commission has over 23,500 pending appeals and complaints,
and sought the filling up of vacancies in the body. In many States, the
Commissions are either moribund or working at low capacity owing to vacancies,
resulting in a pile-up of appeals. The challenges to the working of the law are
also increasing, with many State departments ignoring the requirement under
Section 4 of the Act to publish information suo motu. The law envisaged
that voluntary disclosure would reduce the need to file an application. Since
fines are rarely imposed, officers give incomplete, vague or unconnected
information to applicants with impunity. Proposals to make it easier to pay the
application fee, and develop a reliable online system to apply for information,
are missing. These are the serious lacunae. Attempts were made by the UPA
government also to weaken the law, including to remove political parties from
its purview. Any move to enfeeble the RTI Act will deal a blow to transparency.
Vocabulary
Empower: give
someone the authority or power to do something.
Example: Nobody
was empowered to sign checks on her behalf
Synonyms: authorize, entitle, permit, allow, license, sanction, warrant, commission
Legacy: an
amount of money or property left to someone in a will.
Example: Bentham
tells the family that they are about to inherit a legacy from a relative.
Synonyms: bequest, inheritance, heritage, endowment, gift, patrimony, settlement
Allowance: the
amount of something that is permitted, especially within a set of regulations
or for a specified purpose.
Example: A
seventy-five-pound baggage allowance
Synonyms: allocation, allotment, quota, share, ration
Eliminate: completely
remove or get rid of (something).
Example: A
policy that would eliminate inflation
Synonyms: remove, get
rid of, do away with, end, stop, terminate
Junked: discard
or abandon unceremoniously.
Example: Sort
out what could be sold off and junk the rest
Synonyms: throw
away/out, discard, get rid of, dispose of, scrap, toss
out, jettison, chuck
Prestige: widespread
respect and admiration felt for someone or something on the basis of a
perception of their achievements or quality.
Example: He
experienced a tremendous increase in prestige following his victory
Synonyms: status, standing, stature, reputation, repute, regard, fame, note, renown
Transparency: the
condition of being transparent.
Example: The
transparency of ice
Synonyms: translucency, limpidity, clearness, clarity; openness, accountability
Rationale: a
set of reasons or a logical basis for a course of action or a particular
belief.
Example: He
explained the rationale behind the change
Synonyms: reason(s), reasoning, thinking, logic, grounds, sense, principle, theory
Appeal: a
serious or urgent request, typically one made to the public.
Example: His
mother made an appeal for the return of the ring
Synonyms: retrial, re-examination
Envisage: contemplate
or conceive of as a possibility or a desirable future event.
Example: The
Rome Treaty envisaged free movement across frontiers
Synonyms: imagine, contemplate, visualize, envision, picture, conceive
of, think of
Vague: of
uncertain, indefinite, or unclear character or meaning.
Example: Many
patients suffer vague symptoms
Synonyms: indistinct, indefinite, indeterminate, unclear,hazy, fuzzy, misty
Lacunae: an
unfilled space or interval; a gap.
Example: The
journal has filled a lacuna in Middle Eastern studies
Reliable: consistently
good in quality or performance; able to be trusted.
Example: A
reliable source of information
Synonyms: dependable, good, well-founded, authentic, valid, genuine, sound
Transparency: the
condition of being transparent.
Example: The
transparency of ice
Synonyms: translucency, limpidity, clearness, clarity; openness, accountability
