[open-government] FOI Anniversary Creating Momentum for India to Improve Political Finance Transparency

Thu Oct 24 15:36:25 UTC 2013

Hey all,

As some of you already know, there has been a heated debate in India in the
past few months over the proposed amendment to the RTI law, with
significant consequences to the transparency of political parties.

We wanted to share our position with you, here:
http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/10/24/foi-anniversary-creating-momentum-for-india-to-improve-political-finance-transparency/

Would love to hear your thoughts, and hope to see many of you next week in
London!

Best,

Julia

FOI Anniversary Creating Momentum for India to Improve Political Finance
Transparency<http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/10/24/foi-anniversary-creating-momentum-for-india-to-improve-political-finance-transparency/>
by Júlia Keseru <http://sunlightfoundation.com/people/jkeseru/>Oct. 24,
2013, 11:06 a.m.

The eighth anniversary<http://www.freedominfo.org/2013/10/eighth-anniversary-prompts-reflections-on-indian-rti-act/>
of
India’s freedom of information law, the Right to Information Act (RTI),
could become an important milestone in the country’s transparency agenda.
The 2005 sunshine <http://rti.gov.in/webactrti.htm> law has already
made a tremendous
impact<http://www.indianexpress.com/news/8-years-on-rti-act-counts-its-milestones/1181554/>
on
how Indian decision makers respond to public scrutiny
efforts<http://www.indianexpress.com/news/8-years-on-rti-act-counts-its-milestones/1181554/1>,
and this year has seen a heated public
debate<http://m.firstpost.com/politics/rti-call-a-thon-how-citizensengaging-mps-to-save-rti-act-1024851.html?page=1>
around
the finances of political parties with the anniversary creating momentum to
rethink (and maybe even redesign) the country's current political finance
transparency landscape.
Political Finance Transparency and Freedom of Information Legislation in
India

But how does freedom of information lead us to political finance
transparency? In India, regulations on the transparency of funding
political parties (and election campaigns) are in pretty bad
shape<http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/demanding-transparency-in-political-finance/article4938187.ece>,
even compared to other loosely regulated
systems<http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/07/29/regulating-money-in-politics-a-global-shortcoming/>.
According to Global
Integrity<http://www.globalintegrity.org/report/India/2011/scorecard%20>
and
the International
IDEA<http://www.idea.int/political-finance/country.cfm?id=105>,
there are basically no real requirements to disclose most of the donations
to political parties and candidates, no limits on individual donations and
the major share (!) of funding are received from anonymous
contributions<http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/blogs/blog-datadelve/article5182451.ece>.
When it comes to enforcement, there is no requirement in law for any
independent auditing of political parties, nor there is a separate agency
to effectively monitor political financing - just to mention a few of the
loopholes in the Indian
law<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representation_of_the_People_Act_(India)>
.

And this is where freedom of information legislation comes into the
picture. A few months ago, a couple of Indian transparency activists from
the Association of Democratic Reforms <http://adrindia.org/> had asked six
political parties to disclose the details of voluntary financial
contributions they have received alongside their donors’ names and
addresses. Most of the asked political parties refused to give that
information claiming that they do not come under the RTI Act. But the
Central Information Commission of India has ruled in a landmark judgment
that political parties come within the ambit of the RTI
Act<http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/political-parties-come-within-ambit-of-rti-act-cic/article4778358.ece>.
The order made a fair and reasonable argument by pointing out how odd it
would be to

*“(...) argue that transparency is good for all State organs but not so
good for political parties, which, in reality, control all the vital organs
of the State.”*

Since then, political parties have done their best to exclude themselves
from the RTI. The government has introduced an amendment to the RTI
Act<http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/parliamentary-panel-seeks-peoples-views-on-rti-amendment-bill/article5157555.ece>
which
seeks to insert an explanation stating that political parties should not be
considered as public authorities and therefore should be exempt from the
FOI legislation. The move evoked unprecedented public uproar and citizens
and activists (such as the RTI
Call-a-Thon<http://www.firstpost.com/politics/rti-call-a-thon-how-citizens-are-engaging-with-mps-to-save-the-rti-act-1024851.html>
campaign) are
now calling their Members of
Parliament<http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2013/09/handful-citizens-good-mps-working-save-rti-act/>
to
bring political parties under the ambit of the RTI Act.

[image: SaveRTI] <http://sunlightfoundation.com/media/2013/10/SaveRTI.jpg>
The Need for Political Finance Transparency

Given the situation, those in India who are advocating for RTI laws that
would apply to parties are pursuing a reasonable next step to shine a light
on the funding of political parties. In line with the conclusions of the
Central Information Commission of India, it is imperative that voters know
the source of political funds and how they are spent in order to make
informed decisions, gauge the corrupting influence of contributions on
candidates and parties or the policies they pursue, to prevent or curtail
illegal fundraising, to uncover potential conflicts of interests, to ensure
the funds are being spent within the limits of the law, to promote
competition between the parties, and to determine whether further changes
to a country’s system of political financing are required.

And although not “public” entities in the traditional sense of the word,
political parties have a significant impact and influence on government
institutions, policies, and the democratic process, as well as access to
public resources. As such, they can be considered quasi-governmental
entities to which Right To Information/FOI laws should apply.
According to Transparency
International<http://www.transparency.org/files/content/corruptionqas/Access_to_information_and_political_parties.pdf>
the
general trend globally is towards increasing the scope of the entities
covered by FOI legislation and the most progressive legislation already
includes legal entities that perform public functions. In order to fairly
evaluate the activities of political parties, the public has a right to
know where party funding is coming from and how it is being spent. The
application of RTI laws to parties is an important step towards making such
information public.
So Is RTI Enough?

Ultimately, however, regardless of the impact of applying FOI laws to
political parties, that step alone is unlikely to provide sufficient
transparency for political finance. Bringing political parties under the
RTI Act may be a crucial first step, but in the long term pro-active
political finance transparency laws must be adopted to reduce corruption
and the appearance of corruption, while building trust in the democratic
process.

At a minimum, a political finance reporting regime must include detailed,
itemized information on all sources of party income and all expenditures.
Disclosure of contributions should allow for analysis of the donor’s
interests and potential influence, therefore should include the donor’s
name and the date and amount of the contribution. If the donor is an
individual, the donor’s occupation and employer should also be disclosed.
Summary information, including year-to-date totals should also be included.
 Disclosure should be timely, and more frequent during elections.
Information should be made available as open
data<http://sunlightfoundation.com/opendataguidelines/#section-how-to-make-data-public>:
most importantly published online, in an open and structured way.
Regardless of the mechanism, the public has a concrete and urgent interest
in accessing that information.

Numerous global organizations recommend that political parties adhere to
strict accounting rules and make their information public. Examples include
the Council of Europe guidelines on the financing of political
parties<http://www.osce.org/odihr/37843>,
and the Recommendation on the Common Rules against Corruption in the
Funding of Political Parties and Electoral
Campaigns<https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc.jsp?id=2183>,
Transparency International’s policy position on political
financing<http://www.transparency.org/whatwedo/pub/policy_position_no._01_2009_standards_on_political_funding_and_favours>,
or recommendations and analysis from
OECD<http://www.oecd.org/about/membersandpartners/publicaffairs/Transparency%20and%20Integrity%20in%20Political%20Finance.pdf>
and
the International
IDEA<http://www.idea.int/publications/funding_parties/index.cfm>
.

The Sunlight Foundation applauds efforts to create more transparency around
political party financing in India. Below you will find links detailing our
recommendations on political finance and lobbying transparency in the US.
We are creating more detailed guidelines that apply to other national
contexts to help local activists and policy-makers improve their systems.

*Relevant Sunlight Resources*

On Political Finance Transparency:

http://sunlightfoundation.com/issues/campaign-finance/

http://sunlightfoundation.com/policy/disclosingmoney/

On Lobbying Disclosure:

http://sunlightfoundation.com/issues/lobbying/

http://sunlightfoundation.com/issues/e-filing/

On Data Disclosure Formats:

http://sunlightfoundation.com/opendataguidelines/

-- 
Júlia Keserű
International Program Coordinator

1818 N Street NW, Suite 300
Washington, DC 20036
(1) 202-742-1520 *280

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