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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | CIC to decide if political outfits come under RTI; parties yet to show inclination towards adopting legislation-Nidhi Sharma

CIC to decide if political outfits come under RTI; parties yet to show inclination towards adopting legislation-Nidhi Sharma

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published Published on Nov 1, 2012   modified Modified on Nov 1, 2012
-The Economic Times

A full bench of the Central Information Commission, the final appellate authority on Right to Information (RTI) Act, will on Thursday decide whetherpolitical outfits should come under the purview of the Act. Political parties are yet to show any inclination towards adopting the transparency legislation.

Chief Information Commissioner Satyananda Mishra and Information Commissioners ML Sharma and Annapurna Dixit would give their verdict on separate appeals by RTI activist Subhash Agrawal and Association for Democratic Reforms. The commission has been examining the matter since September.

It had given notices to all political parties to appear before the bench and give their views on whether or not they should be treated as public authorities like government departments. All national parties, barring NCP and CPI, chose to ignore the notice and did not appear for the hearing on September 26.

The bench decided to give time till the first week of October. However, even after a month national parties like Congress, BJP, SP, BSP and CPM have refused to respond. Till Wednesday evening, only NCP and CPI have given written submissions before CIC.

Political parties have been arguing that they are not government-funded entities and do not fall under the ambit of the RTI Act. CPI, represented by D Raja, had contended that morally RTI Act should apply to political parties, but technically there was no ground for it. However, ADR has prepared a detailed presentation and argued that indirectly political parties get major benefits from the government. These include land at concessional rates, party offices on government land and media reach during elections.

ADR presented that all political parties receive government funds, but claim tax exemptions on 100% of their incomes, under Section 13A of the Income-Tax Act. As per ADR's estimates, tax exemption by six national parties for financial years 2006-07 to 2008-09 is 510.02 crore. Congress received maximum tax exemption, 300.92 crore, during the period, followed by BJP, 141.25 crore. The tax rebates enjoyed by other national parties for the period are as follows: BSP: 39.84 crore, CPM: 18.13 crore, CPI: 24 lakh and NCP: 9.64 crore.

As per the RTI Act, a public authority is defined under Section 2 (h) as "any authority or body or institution of self-government established or constituted - (a) by or under the Constitution; (b) by any other law made by Parliament; (c) by any other law made by state legislature; (d) by notification issued or order made by the appropriate government, and includes any - body owned, controlled or substantially financed; non-government organisation substantially financed, directly or indirectly by funds provided by the appropriate government." Interpretation of 'substantially funded' would be the key in the CIC judgement.

The Economic Times, 1 November, 2012, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/cic-to-decide-if-political-outfits-come-under-rti-parties-yet-to-show-inclination-towards-adopting-legisl


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