A STUDY ON THE COVERAGE OF RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT, 2005 (RTI) IN NEWSPAPERS

International Research Journal of Human Resources and Social Sciences Impact Factor- 3.866

Vol. 3, Issue 6, June 2016 ISSN(O): (2349-4085) ISSN(P): (2394-4218)

© Associated Asia Research Foundation (AARF)

A STUDY ON THE COVERAGE OF RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT,

2005 (RTI) IN NEWSPAPERS

Dr. P. Chitra, M.Sc, Ph.D Assistant Professor

School of Journalism and New Media Studies Tamil Nadu Open University, India.

ABSTRACT

Right to information Act (RTI) 2005 is considered as the second freedom that India has

got. It is one of the important tools available for the citizens to make the government

accountable. As media is considered as the fourth pillar of the nation, this study aims to analyse

the coverage of RTI related news in newspapers.

This study uses survey method to identify the coverage of Right to Information Act in

newspapers.

Key words: Right to Information Act, newspapers, coverage, importance

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 HISTORY OF INFORMATION ACTS IN GLOBAL SCENARIO

The earliest reference to the Right to Information is found in Sweden, where in 1776, a

convention on granting Right to Information to its entire citizen was passed. Berlin based

transparency International in their recent survey says that out of 159 nations Sweden placed at

the fifth position. After the formation of United Nation, UN General Assembly passed the

resolution in 1946.

The Right to Information commonly understood as the “Right to Access Information held

number now is upwards of 94, and this Act is under active consideration in another 10-20

countries. In 1990, no inter-Governmental organisation had recognised the Right to Information,

and now all multilateral development banks and a number of other international financial

institutions have adopted information disclosure policies. In 1990, the Right to Information was

seen predominantly as an administrative governance reform, whereas today it is increasingly

being seen as a fundamental human right. Mexico was one of the first countries in Latin

America to pass a “right to information” law, with the signing into law by President Fox of the

Federal Transparency and Access to Public Government Information Law (RTI Law) in June

2002. The objective of the law was to tackle corruption and foster democracy in Mexico. The

overseeing body has the power under the Law to adopt regulations on various matters including,

importantly, on classification. “Freedom of information is fundamental Human right and is touch

stone for all freedoms to which the United Nation is consecrated”.

Article 19 of International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) 1966, to

which India is a signatory also declared freedom of information to its entire citizen. 94 countries

in the world have already enacted the RTI. These include, North America, most of Europe, South

Africa, India, Australia and New Zealand. In over 25 countries efforts are pending to enact the

RTI law. These are most of South America, East African, South East Asian region and parts of

Russian federation. Most of Democratic Countries have RTI. It can also be correlated to

development.

1.2 HISTORY OF RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT IN INDIA

Right to Information started to originate for the first time when a ruling was given by

Supreme Court in 1982 (transfer of judges) that “Disclosure of information as regards the functioning of Government must be rule and secrecy an exception”

In famous case of Mr.Kulwal vs. Jaipur Municipal Corporation in 1986, the Supreme

Court gave clear cut directives that freedom of speech and expression provided under article 19

of constitution clearly implies Right to Information, as without information the freedom of

speech and expression cannot be completely enjoyed by the citizens.

There have been many activists whose continuous struggle and movements have brought

this change. Some of the notable struggles are the famous Mazdoor Kissan Shakthi Sanghatan

Shri Harsh Mandar, then divisional commissioner of Bilaspur (Madhya Pradesh) in 1996, to

throw open the registers of employment exchange and records of Public Distribution System to

the citizens, the agitation led by Shri Anna Hazare in 2001, as well as the agitation by NGO in

small place like Bhilangana Block in Tehri, Gadhwal to a name a few.

The intervention by Supreme Court brought about by Shri H.D. Shouri on Freedom of

Information Bill in 2002 also deserves a mentioning here. Some of states like Tamil Nadu, Goa,

Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh and Assam have their own RTI Acts.

The Indian Parliament had enacted the “Freedom of Information Act, 2002” in order to

promote, transparency and accountability in administration. The National Common Minimum

Program of the Government envisaged that “Freedom of Information Act” will be made more “progressive, participatory and meaningful”, following which, decision was made to repeal the “Freedom of Information Act, 2002” and enact a new legislation in its place. Accordingly, “Right to Information Bill, 2004” (RTI) was passed by both the Houses of Parliament on May, 2005 which received the assent of the President on 15th June, 2005. “The Right to Information Act” was notified in the Gazette of India on 21st June, 2005. The “The Right to Information Act”

became fully operational from 12th October, 2005. This new law empowers Indian citizens to

seek any accessible information from a Public Authority and makes the Government and its

functionaries more accountable and responsible.

The Right to information Act, 2005(which came into full effect on 12 October, the 120th

day of its enactment), is one of the significant legislations authorized by the Parliament of India

1.3. NEED AND IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY:

There has been very few studies in the coverage of RTI related news in media. Studies so

far have been focusing on the effectiveness of the RTI Act. This study will explain the coverage

of RTI related news in newspapers and the selection criteria that are considered for publishing a

RTI based news in the newspaper. The study will analyze the importance given by various

newspapers towards RTI related news, also focuses on awareness and impact of newspapers' in

reference to RTI coverage among youth

1.4 OBJECTIVES:

 To find the selection criteria behind RTI related news in newspaper.

 To find the awareness and impact of newspapers' RTI coverage among youth  To find the viewpoints of RTI Activists on newspaper coverage of RTI.

1.5 LIMATIONS OF THE STUDY

For the purpose of this study only the Chennai edition of the various newspapers were

taken in account. The supplements that come with the newspapers were not analyzed for the

study.

2 REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Rajan (2009) in his article, ‘Information Rights: A Jurisprudential Audit‟ found that a

government of secrecy injured the people they seek to serve. They damaged their own integrity

and operation. They bred distrust, dampened the fervor of their citizens and mocked their loyalty.

Uninformed people could never be free. Therefore he said, it was good to see themselves living

in a world, which under the pressure of sovereign -will, thought intensely on core human issues.

Information rights were tactical subset of human rights.

Jain (2009) in his article ‘Right to Information-challenge or opportunity‟ discussed that

the litmus test of advancement of a nation was what, when, how much information about various

governance related issues, had a direct or indirect bearing on the lives of the citizens. It was

actually shared with them; and the enactment of RTI Act 2005 had been hauled as one of the

most significant, useful, path breaking administration reforms in post independence era of public

administration in the country. Thereby he said, India joined a select league of nation who had

passed this kind of 'modern' legislation.

Agrawal (2009) in his article „The Official Secret Act to Right to Information Act: dawn

of „glasnot‟ explained that the prayer to god in sacred verse (Tamso ma Jyotirgamaya) to lead

mankind from darkness to light might be to some extent fulfilled with regard to functioning of

public authorities because of the RTI Act. He also added that already due to this Act, light is

being thrown on some matters which were treated as confidential in the past. For example, the

members of the Judiciary had because of RTI Act, agreed to disclose their financial assets for

Chadah (2006) in her article „Right to Information Regime in India: A critical appraisal‟

analyzed that to break those negative influences, more stringent penal provision was needed to

ensure personnel liability of the official concerned. In the case of debatable refusal of

information what was important at that juncture was to give honest chance to the Act to operate

without negative stumbling blocks and bottlenecks.

Dey, Dreze and Roy (2007) in their article „The Right to Transparent Governance‟

discussed that from the beginning of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)

campaign, the Right to Information, Right to Work were seen no just as means of fighting

corruption or unemployment, but also as complementary steps towards people's empowerment

and participatory democracy. He also added that the active use of RTI was also seen as essential

condition for the success of NREGA, since corruption was one of chief enemies of effective

public works programme and constantly invoked as arguments against NREGA.

Kasyap (2009) in his article „Right to Information‟ expressed that in view of that, the

appointment of retired bureaucrats in majority might not be justified rather went against the

express provision of the act. In addition that might also give an impression that all those who

were responsible for administrative culture of secrecy and then trying to ensure transparency.

According to study, 58 percent information commissioners were from administrative and

governance sector. Out of 60 information commissioners 27 were retired IAS officers.”

Jain and Jain (2009) in their article „Promoting Right to Information through

E-governance-A case of E-Soochna and other initiative in H.P.‟ analyzed that the rural

development schemes of the Government of India and government of Himachal Pradesh,

Panchayat wise list of ongoing rural development schemes along with their head sanction date,

sanctioned amount, amount spent, and present status of the scheme were entered and public

could take print out of any of that information from the 'E-Soochna' kiosk by paying nominal

charges.”

Kejriwal (2007) in his article „Right to Information myths or reality‟ quoted an

interesting episode of Central information commissioners O.P. Kejriwal. The quote said that in

1764, an English traveler by name Edward came to Indian and went around many places and

finally came to Taj Mahal. Wonder stuck he wrote in his diary, that the people of the world be

divided into two categories -those who have seen Taj and those who have not. He concluded that

mindset of pre October 2005 and post October 2005 scenario. RTI were playing their role but

still a revolution was needed to change pathetic attitude of bureaucracy.

Goel (2007) in his article „Right to Information and administrative reforms‟ opined that

the Right to Information would provide open surgery to administration and make more efforts to

improve the health of the administrative system. If implementation was in right earnest, RTI Act

would optimize the use of resources. He added that RTI and administrative reforms are two sides

of the same coin.

Kumar (2006) enumerated about the purpose and scope of Right to Information Act

(RTI), Role of Information Officers, appeals and educational and training programmes. He said

that the Right to Information Act was a very powerful tool to bring openess; transparency in the

era of accountability. It empowered the citizens to seek information and ask questions from the

government organizations, as was done by elected representatives in the legislature. Any

information which could not be denied to Parliament /State legislature could not be denied under

that act. He added that in turn would exert both internal and external pressure to improve the

work culture of the government.

Yashada (2006) analyzed the historical perspective of Right to Information Act (RTI),

and discussed about RTI cases. He said that there was a paradigm shift then with Right to

Information Act, 2005. It was an Act which would be implemented by the people and acted upon

by the Government. The Public was supreme, so their interest.

Pruti (2006) reviewed various legal aspects about Right to Information Act, 2005 and

Supreme Court‟s comments on RTI Act which also elaborated various State level RTI acts that

were present and gave legal perspective. She said that the people of the country have the right to

know every public act; everything that was done in public was, by their public functioning. They

were entitled to know the particulars of every public transaction in all its bearing.

Srivastra (2006) explained RTI in legal perspective and RTI's relation with Human

Rights. It gave all the case histories related to freedom of information. He gave vast coverage on

all state‟s Right to Information Acts. He explained that the central enactment made in 2002 was

not RTIA but FOIA. The entire legislature which made their respective enactments also was

FOIA and not RTIA. There was fundamental difference between Freedom and a Right. A Right

is powerful exercise of the Freedom whereas Freedom is a meekly attempt to exercise the Right.

was very powerful enactment which unfortunately had not received the amount of publicity it

needed to make citizens aware of their right to seek information from the concerned authorities.

Nilekani (2008) said that India‟s policy makers and politicians had been great at making

agendas and blue prints and the five year plans had been nothing if not exhaustive. Their big

weakness had been in execution. They needed committed and honest efforts for overall reforms

for betterment of their beloved citizens. In fact half reforms were worse than no reforms”. RTI

was playing their role but still a revolution was needed to change the apathetic attitude of

bureaucracy.

Palanithurai (2009) in his article 'Problems and scope in handling RTI from grassroots

perspective' expressed that after the introduction of RTI, people attempted to use RTI but

responses were not positive. It was interesting to note that the news item appearing in

newspapers in Tamil Nadu on use of RTI were not encouraging the People to apply under RTI.

Newspapers carried news of struggle in using RTI rather than stories of success. Having seen the

struggle, people don‟t opt to use the RTI. A perception had been developed that if the RTI was

used by any individual to claim the information, it was construed as anti social. Even officials

who were working in rural development sector treated the individual who used the RTI as real

enemies.

Rambrahmam (2009) in his article „Implementation process of RTI‟ discussed that the

law in question could be used effectively if media educate themselves about RTI as it enabled

both macro and micro policies issues to be adhered. He also pointed out that the major

government decisions as also the regular, nevertheless equally important issues like drinking

water, electricity, mending of roads could receive equal attention if the act is used in intelligent

and creative manner.

Dhaka (2009) in his article „RTI Act and good governance‟ opined that the follow steps

might be taken: Multimedia, especially TV Channels, be used for information dissemination;

best practice on RTI be show cased; nukked nataks, talk shows be organized regularly on various

forms of media.

Mander and Joshi in their article on „The movement for Right to Information in India‟

explains that while the government‟s orders were enabling for the common person to access

much of the information required for everyday concerns, CHRI found that the orders were not

(„Jaanane ka Haq‟) containing the texts of the orders was printed and circulated to the press and

whenever the government required political mileage out of it. This publication, even a year and a

half later is not freely available, leaving the lay public unaware of the orders. The government

claims to have given “press statements” regarding these orders, but these have also been sporadic

and no sustained campaign through the press or the electronic media has been planned or

executed. Even otherwise, with a literacy rate as low as 43.45% , and many of the areas being

tribal belts with poor accessibility to any means of communication, these efforts are hardly likely

to be effective.

Rizvi (2007) in „Data Privacy & Right to Information: The Phenomenon of Strategic

Control & Conflicting Interests‟ examined that the Right to Information offer for setting out the

sensible system of right to information for citizens is to safe and sound access to information

under the direct of public establishment, in order to support transparency and responsibility in

the working of every public authority but it is necessary to complement these contradictory

interests while preserving the supremacy of the democratic model, now therefore, it is

convenient to afford for delivering certain information to citizens who wish to have it.

3 METHODOLOGY

3.1 TOOLS OF DATA COLLECTION  Content Analysis

3.2 SAMPLING

A total of four popular local Newspapers were taken for Content analysis which includes

the following

Four English Morning dailies such as The Hindu, New Indian Express, Deccan Chronicle

and Times of India were taken for study. The analysis a period of two months were taken and

each of the above newspaper were analysed. All articles that have 'RTI' word mentioned in it are

considered for content analysis.

3.3 FACTORS OF CONTENT ANALYSIS

2. Column-Wise Coverage

3. Placement of News

4. RTI news article in Reader Friendly pages i.e., the article on an odd page of

newspaper

5. RTI articles in a particular Days of week

6. Focus of News on various subjects

7. Mention of „RTI‟ word in headline

8. Usage of Graphic Elements in RTI Articles

9. RTI Articles on the Delhi HC vs. Supreme Court issue

10.RTI Articles on Death of the RTI Activist issue

4 ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATIONS

4.1 PRESENTATION OF DATA

Tabulation have been done for English Morning dailies. This tabulation is done

considering the two months content from the newspaper

4.2 DATA FROM CONTENT ANALYSIS

4.2.1 FREQUENCY OF RTI NEWS

Table 4.1 Frequency of News

Newspaper Total No. of articles No. of RTI articles

Percentage of RTI Articles

Deccan Chronicle 5684 24 0.422

New Indian

Express 7482 18 0.241

The Hindu 6786 26 0.383

The Times of

India 7482 45 0.663

Table 4.1 shows that Right to information Act (RTI) coverage is less than 1% of total

newspaper‟s news articles among all Chennai editions‟ newspaper. Among the news Dailies

taken for study, Times of India has more RTI related items with 45 articles. In general English

4.2.2 FREQUENCY OF RTI NEWS IN JANUARY 2010

Table 4.2 Frequency of News-January 2010

Newspaper Total No. of articles No. of RTI articles % of RTI Articles

Deccan Chronicle 2940 18 0.612

New Indian

Express 3870 16 0.413

The Hindu 3510 21 0.598

Times of India 3870 33 0.852

Table 4.2 shows that Times of India had coverage on RTI with 33 articles of the total

articles. The Times for India Carried more articles on RTI with 0.8 % which is followed by

Deccan Chronicle (0.6%) and then by The Hindu (0.5%).

4.2.3 FREQUENCY OF RTI NEWS IN FEBRUARY 2010

Table 4.3 Frequency of News-February 2010

Newspaper Total No. of articles No. of RTI articles % of RTI Articles

Deccan Chronicle 2744 6 0.218

NIE 3612 2 0.055

The Hindu 3276 5 0.152

The Times of India 3612 12 0.332

Table 4.3 shows that the frequency of covering RTI news is done more by The Times of

India with 12 (0.3%) of the total articles in the study period

4.2.4 COLUMN-WISE COVERAGE:

Table 4.5 Column wise coverage

Strength of the

column DC NIE The Hindu Times of India

Number % Number % Number % Number %

Single Column 9 37 6 33 3 11 12 27

Three Column 6 25 2 11 8 31 8 18

Four or more column

4 17 5 28 9 35 10 22

Total 24 100 18 100 26 100 45 100

The Hindu had the most (35%) of its RTI coverage as four or more columns.

4.2.5 PLACEMENT OF NEWS

Table 4.6 Placement of news

News region DC NIE The Hindu Times of India

Number % Number % Number % Number %

Front Page _{4 17 1 6 3 12 8 18}

City _{8 33 8 44 4 15 10 22}

State _{2 8 2 11 4 15 1 2}

Nation _{4 17 3 17 12 46 21 47}

Opinion/

Editorial 5 21 4 22 3 12 3 7

Assorted _{1 4 0 0 0 0 2 4}

Total _{24 100 18 100 26 100 45 100}

From table 4.6 it was found that

 The Time of India had the most (45%) of its RTI news articles placed in City Section.  New Indian Express had the most (18%) of its RTI coverage placed in State section.  New Indian Express had the most (22%) of RTI related news articles in Editorial/

Opinion Section.

4.2.6 RTI NEWS ARTICLE IN READER FRIENDLY PAGES

Table 4.7 RTI news in reader friendly pages

Deccan Chronicle New Indian Express The Hindu The Times of India

Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage

16 67 12 67 13 50 11 24

Deccan Chronicle and New Indian Express had the most (67%) of its RTI articles in

4.2.7 RTI ARTICLES IN DAYS OF WEEK

The Hindu had the most (19%) of its RTI coverage on Sunday. New Indian Express had

the most (44%) of its RTI coverage on Wednesday . The Times of India had the most (16%) of

its RTI coverage on Friday .

4.2.8 FOCUS OF NEWS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS

Table 4.8 Focus of news on various subjects

Subjects

Deccan Chronicle Indian Express The Hindu The Times of India

Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage People's Usage of

RTI

7 29 1 5.5 4 15 11 24

Government‟s Reply

0 0 1 5.5 2 8 8 18

NGO 0 0 0 0 2 11 1 2

Court Judgment 9 38 5 28 11 42 12 27

Commission Judgment

1 4 3 17 1 4 5 11

Politics 28 2 7 27 8 18 0 0

Awareness 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Assorted 5 21 4 22 7 27 8 18

Total 24 100 18 100 26 100 45 100

Table 4.8 shows that Deccan Chronicle had the most (29%) covered People‟s Usage of

RTI articles. Government‟s Reply focused RTI news items has been mostly covered by Times of

India (18%).

Court Judgment focused RTI news items have been mostly covered by Deccan Chronicle

with 38%. Commission Judgment focused RTI news items have been mostly covered by New

Indian Express with 17%.

4.2.9 USAGE OF THE WORD ‘RTI’ IN THE CONTENT

Table 4.9 Using the work ‘RTI’ in the content

Deccan Chronicle New Indian Express The Hindu The Times of India

Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage

Deccan Chronicle tops the English morning dailies having 58% of its RTI articles „RTI‟

word in the headline is used. This is followed by „The Hindu‟ with 46% and New Indian Express

(44%) and The Times of India (18%).

4.2.10 USAGE OF GRAPHICS IN RTI ARTICLES

Table 4.10 Usage of Graphics elements in RTI articles

Deccan Chronicle New Indian Express The Hindu The Times of India

Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage

4 17 2 11 0 0 26 58

From table 4.10 it is seen that „The Times of India‟ tops with 58% followed by „Deccan

Chronicle‟ (17%) and New Indian express (11%) uses graphics to explain the content of RTI

related news in the newspaper.

4.2.11 RTI ARTICLES ON THE DELHI HC VS. SUPREME COURT ISSUE

Table 4.11 RTI articles on Delhi HC vs. Supreme Court Issue

Deccan Chronicle New Indian Express The Hindu The Times of India

Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage

6 25 4 22 3 11 5 11

Table 4.11 shows that Deccan chronicle (25%) has more RTI articles on Delhi HC vs.

Supreme Court issue which is followed by New Indian express with 22%

5. FINDINGS

 Right to Information Act (RTI) coverage is less than 1% of total newspaper‟s news articles among all Chennai editions‟ newspaper.

 Times of India have more RTI related items

 The Hindu had more importance to RTI news articles with most of their RTI Coverage

being four or more columns.

 New Indian express has most of its RTI news stories in city section and they have voiced

5.3. CONCLUSION

The Indian newspapers need to have more awareness oriented RTI coverage. They must mention

„RTI‟ word in headline of RTI articles and also have graphical representation to be noticed by

the youth. Newspapers need to provide specific columns or any kind of new space for RTI

regularly. They must make more usage of RTI to get information and expose scandals and

corruption thereby making sure of open and transparent governance. More coverage of RTI

success stories will serve as motivational aspect and increase the RTI usage among public.

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