>
> Parliament is meant to make laws. Who would you rather have
> make / debate / discuss laws, professionally educated and
> qualified lawyers OR people like Anna Hazare and Arvind
> Kejriwal whose sole (misguided) slogan is "Parliament is
> servant of some nebulous conception of "people""?
>
I am amazed at the level of general knowledge held by some of
the respected people on this group. This, I believe, is a
group to do with RTI. Are they not aware of their own
antecedents ?
How has the whole RTI laws come about ?
Do people realise that Hazare was one of the prime forces for
the RTI revolution itself ? The first campaign was organised
at the Azad Maidan, Mumbai, in 1997. The State Government was
giving only promises, but it failed to crystallise it in many
sessions of the Vidhan Sabha. He had to make agitations,
dharnas, morchas, mauns/ fasts many times. Public addresses
were organised in many towns and programmes were arranged.
Posters, banners and folders were printed and distributed in
thousands. All this resulted in the awakening of the citizens
of Maharashtra and making them aware of their fundamental
Right to Information. The Maharashtra Government made many
promises, but it failed to keep even one. There were several
public demonstrations all over Maharashtra for few years.
Finally, Mr. Hazare went on fast-unto-death on August 9, 2003
at Azad Maidan, Mumbai. The Govt finally yielded, The RTI Act
in Maharashtra came into effect in 2003, the subsequent RTI
Act of India is derived primarily from this resource.
For the RTI Act of India (2005) other people also came into
the fray. Two names worth a mention are Arvind Kejriwal
and Aruna Roy. There are other names in the list too
which I am omitting at the moment for brevity. The Delhi
campaign was mainly Kejriwal along with Manish Sisodia and
Abhinandan Sekhri (of the Public Cause Research Foundation),
at the spearhead. This became a silent social movement since
1998-1999, the Delhi Right to Information Act was passed in
2001. It is strange, that the same people who did it earlier
for RTI, are being considered incompetent for Jan Lokpal at this
stage, by some people quite oblivious of the past !
Finally, because of pressure from multiple centers, at the
national level, Indian Parliament passed the RTI Act in 2005.
It is no point decrying individuals without knowledge. People
with proven track records cannot be put down by ignorance of
other people. That is stupidity ! Please note, for all the
past movements, law professionals always operated at the
background, barring this time where there are big name lawyers
and judges in the IAC itself. It does not need lawyers to start or
direct a movement. it needs leadership qualities and dedication.
As far as history of mankind is concerned, there are only five
or six major law-givers, throughout history. All laws followed
today anywhere in the world are essentially theirs, adopted or
adapted. In terms of chronology they are Hamurabbi, Moses,
Draco, Mohammed, Charlemagne and Napoleon. Statues of these
greats are permanently engraved on the walls of the US Senate.
It is but fortunate, that none of them are from the legal
profession, otherwise nothing would have moved ;-)
Hopefully, this discourse would change the perspective to some
extent for a few.
Dr USM Bish
Bangalore
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