In a move which could once again put the Congress in the firing line and give them a great deal of negative publicity, the party’s core group in its meeting held on Friday evening has given the green signal to bring a fresh bill in the monsoon session of Parliament to keep political parties out of the ambit of the Right to Information Act.
This is with the Central Information Commission announcing that six political parties would now be under the RTI including the Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Nationalist Congress Party, the Communist Party of India, the CPI-Marxist and the Bahujan Samaj Party.
The Congress has been agitated with the CIC’s decision and since then has been holding parleys with the other political parties to find a way out by which to block RTI from accessing information regarding the functioning of the Indian political parties.
It is learnt that the Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kamal Nath would meet the leaders of other political parties with a draft of the amended bill so that it can be brought in the coming session of Parliament.
Sources said that earlier the government had decided to bring in an ordinance to scuttle the move by the CIC, but later it dropped the idea because of opposition from some political parties who said they are opposing the ordinance on the food security bill and would therefore not be able to support an ordinance on the RTI.
Apart from that it was seen as too near the Parliament session but that has not stopped the ruling party from bringing in ordinances on other issues. The political parties which include the BJP said they would support amendments if they are brought in the form of a bill.
Sources say that the amendments state that declaring political parties as public authorities under the RTI Act would "hamper their smooth internal functioning since it will encourage political rivals to file RTI applications with malicious intentions".
They maintain that the Representation of the People Act and the Income Tax Act provide sufficient transparency regarding financial aspects of political parties. Under Section 2 of the RTI Act, the definition of public authority in the proposed amendment will make it clear that "it shall not include any political party registered under the Representation of the Peoples Act", the source said.
As proposed earlier, political parties may not be added in the list of organisations (Section 8) exempted from parting information under the information act. The commission had in its June 3 order said six national parties -- the Congress, the BJP, the NCP, the CPI-M, the CPI and the BSP -- have been substantially funded indirectly by the Central government and they have the character of public authority under the RTI Act as they perform public functions.
Earlier also, the Prime Minister’s Office had proposed certain measures to dilute the RTI, but the opposition was so stiff and so strident, that it was decided to drop the move with sections of the government wanting that file notings and opinions given by bureaucrats should be exempted from public scrutiny.
The latest move is also likely to create a great deal of public uproar with the ruling party being charged with wanting to protect its turf, at whatever cost. Along with this, some sections also say that the courts may intervene and pass adverse comments but since Parliament would pass a bill to this effect which incorporates the amendments, it may be difficult for the judiciary to move against the political parties.
The core group also discussed the issue of the creation of a separate state of Telangana and it is learnt that a Congress working committee would be held at the end of the month and there is also a proposal to hold an all party meeting with sources saying that a number of meetings would be held before the issue is finally resolved.
While the pressure to give in to Telangana is increasing within the Congress, many important senior leaders are not in favour of the move to split Andhra Pradesh down the middle, with leaders saying it is a very sensitive issue and cannot be dealt with just for vote bank politics.
