RTI Act amendment: Amid Opposition fire, Vaishnaw says won’t affect disclosure obligated by laws

Recalling that the Supreme Court in the Puttaswamy judgment had held privacy to be an integral part of Right to Life, Vaishnaw underlined that protection of personal information was important.

In response to a letter written by Congress leader Jairam Ramesh on March 23, Vaishnaw cited section 3 of the DPDP Act and said, “Subject to the provisions of this Act, it shall… (c ), not apply to (ii) personal data that is made or caused to be made publicly available by… (B) any other person who is under the obligation under any law for the time being in force in India to make such personal data publicly available.”

“Any personal information that is subject to disclosure under legal obligations under various laws governing our public representatives and welfare programmes like MGNREGA, etc, will continue to be disclosed under the RTI Act. In fact, the amendment will not restrict disclosure of personal information, rather it aims to strengthen the privacy rights of the individuals and prevent the potential misuse of the law,” Vaishnaw said.

Ramesh had written to Vaishnaw that the new law had completely eliminated the “proviso in Section 8 (1) (j) of the RTI Act 2005 that gives citizens equal right to information as legislators who represent them”, adding that this change was unwarranted as the original RTI Act “had enough guardrails to protect unwarranted invasion of privacy”. He had urged the minister to “pause, review and repeal section 44 (3) of the Data Protection Act 2023, which destroys the RTI Act 2005”.

Opposition leaders like Rahul Gandhi, Akhilesh Yadav, K C Venugopal and John Brittas had also written to Vaishnaw to repeal Section 44 (3) of the Act, as it “amends the Right to Information”. They stated that the amendment to section 8 (1) (j) of the RTI Act, as introduced by section 44 (3) of the DPDP Act, seeks to exempt all personal information from disclosure.

Amendments made through the DPDP Act drastically weaken the RTI Act and will have a detrimental impact on fundamental right to information, they had said.

At a joint press conference Thursday, Gogoi said, “Citizens have rights and governments must protect these. The BJP thinks they have all the rights and citizens must obey them.”

Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Priyanka Chaturvedi said, “They will make you a data fiduciary if you are handling data for investigative journalism, make you accountable and also impose heavy fines.”

“You are taking RTI towards ‘road to ignorance’, so that people do not get to know about any corruption. The DPDP Act in 2019 had no such provision, in 2021, after it went to the JPC, no such provision was there either. In 2023 they brought in these provisions which will make RTI null and void,” she said.

The law proposes to amend Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act, 2005. This prevents a public authority from sharing anyone’s personal information on two main grounds – that the disclosure will have no bearing on any public activity, and that revealing such information would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of an individual, unless such disclosure is justified in larger public interest.

However, the law proposes that the personal information of public officials will not be disclosed under the RTI Act. The two key grounds, that such information could be disclosed provided it serves a larger public interest, have been done away with. “In section 8 of the Right to Information Act, 2005, in sub-section (1), for clause (j), the following clause shall be substituted, namely:— “(j) information which relates to personal information,” reads Section 44 (3) of the law.

Earlier, a clutch of organisations dealing with right to information and internet freedom launched a campaign against a section of the Act which, they said, amends section 8 (1) (j) of the RTI Act by imposing a blanket ban on disclosure of personal information without consent – something that will endanger the RTI and journalistic reportage, and also empower errant officials by shielding their identity from any wrongdoing on their part.

The DPDP Act, they said, requires individuals or entities processing personal data to necessarily seek consent of the individual regarding whom they are processing data, unless the data are required for employment purposes or medical emergency.

There is no exception for journalistic purposes in the Act, they contended, meaning that journalistic writing except interviews would be endangered by the law. This will, the activists underlined, also make the RTI toothless, as under it personal information could be denied only if it was unrelated to public activity or public interest.

As per a recent release prepared by them for the press, Rule 22 of the draft rules – these were released on January 3, 2025 – grants the central government “unchecked authority to demand user data from data fiduciaries and intermediaries without any judicial oversight, transparency or safeguards”.

The law, the release said, envisages a Data Protection Board, but Rule 16 of the draft Rules “centralises its appointments, functioning and decision-making within the executive branch, raising serious concerns about political influence and lack of autonomy”.

-With ENS Economic Bureau