Now Reading: RTI at 21: activists cite DPDP threat, audit compliance falters
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RTI at 21: activists cite DPDP threat, audit compliance falters
The Right to Information Act completed 21 years on Tuesday, 13 October 2026. The Hindu reports that only 62.7% of 2,303 registered public authorities submitted mandatory third-party transparency audits for 2024-25, and 26 of 94 government department websites had no mandated suo motu disclosures at all.
Activist and MKSS co-founder Nikhil Dey told Hindustan Times the 2019 amendments making information commissions subservient to the executive and the Digital Personal Data Protection Act are weakening the transparency regime. He said digitisation has placed key records behind administrative logins, contrary to the RTI Act's open-data intent. Dey called for time-bound appointments to information commissions, noting Rajasthan has no Chief Information Commissioner. Both sources note that backlogs and vacancies persist at commissions across India.
Indian Opinion Analysis
Both outlets cover the 21st anniversary of the RTI Act from a critical standpoint, but on different issues. HT leads with an activist interview blaming the 2019 amendments and the DPDP Act for weakening the law, with a claim that digitisation has put records behind admin logins, contrary to the Act's intent. The Hindu leads with data showing that only 62.7% of public authorities submitted mandated transparency audits for 2024-25 and that most websites lack required suo motu disclosures. HT focuses on institutional subservience to the executive, while The Hindu highlights compliance failures. The coverage is uniformly critical of implementation, not of the government's political stance: both present weaknesses as systemic, not partisan. The shared gap is that neither source names a specific government action scheduled in response.
Coverage: 2 sources, 1 government-critical, 1 neutral
Sources (2): hindustantimes.com (government critical), thehindu.com (neutral report)
This brief was synthesised by AI from the 2 sources linked above, so one read covers every framing they carry. Methodology and corrections.
