Overview

• Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge and Jairam Ramesh say the 2019 amendments curtailed the autonomy of information commissioners by putting tenure and pay under executive control.
• Critics argue the 2023 Digital Personal Data Protection Act broadens 'personal information' exemptions, making it easier to deny disclosures that previously served public scrutiny.
• Vacancies and delays dominate the system, with reports noting the Central Information Commission is operating with only two members and a long-vacant chief post, while national pending appeals and complaints were about 4.05 lakh as of mid-2024.
• New assessments cite severe state-level backlogs, including Maharashtra and Karnataka leading in pending cases, and repeated periods when commissions were headless in states such as Jharkhand, Telangana, Goa and Tripura.
• Opposition statements highlight safety concerns for users and stalled protections, pointing to more than 100 killings of RTI activists since 2005 and the non-operational Whistle Blowers Protection Act.