তথ্য অধিকার আইন

The Daily Star, Friday, December 15, 2023

Shamsul Bari and Ruhi Naz

It has been a regular feature of this column to moan over the slow progress of the Right to Information (RTI) regime in Bangladesh. The excitement witnessed in the early days since the adoption of Right to Information Act, 2009 was soon gone, leaving a few die-hard enthusiasts and NGOs—plus those using the law primarily for personal reasons—to keep the ball rolling. The expectation that our politically conscious citizens would use the law to monitor the government’s work never materialised.

We identified two main reasons for this: the lack of sufficient civil society engagement with the law, and the impassive attitude and lack of leadership of the Information Commission of Bangladesh in nudging the law forward. While the former reason persists, there have been some positive developments on the latter front. Read more