Congress Parliamentary Party Chairman Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday criticised the Centre over the Bill that seeks to amend the Right to Information (RTI) Act 2005 saying "the government sees RTI Act as a nuisance and wants to destroy the independence of the Chief Information Commission(CIC)."
"It is the matter of utmost concern that the Central government is hell-bent on completely subverting the historic RTI Act, 2005, which was prepared after wide consultations and passed unanimously by Parliament. It now stands on the brink of extinction," she said in a statement.
"It is clear that the present Central government sees the RTI Act as a nuisance and wants to destroy the status and independence of the CIC, which was put on par with the Central Election Commission (CEC) and the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC)," she added.
The Lok Sabha on Monday passed the RTI (Amendment) Bill, 2019, which seeks to make changes to the central government to decide the fix salaries and tenures structures and other terms and conditions of employment of Information Commissioners (ICs).
Her remarks came three days after it was introduced on Friday. Sonia Gandhi said the government may use its legislative majority to achieve its aims, but in the process, it would disempower each and every citizen of the country.
