JUDGMENT :

Dipak Misra, CJI

Almost a century back, Nobel Laureate T.S. Eliot had disenchantingly written, “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?” Though the content of the statement cannot be said to have lost its fragrance or flavour, yet today, information has become a strong sense of power. Right to information has been treated as a right to freedom of speech and expression as contained in Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution of India. The right to acquire and to disseminate information has been regarded as an intrinsic component of freedom of speech and expression, as stated in Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of India and others v. Cricket Association of Bengal and others, (1995) 2 SCC 161 and People’s Union for Civil Liberties and another v. Union of India and others, (2004) 2 SCC 476.

2. Having stated about the right to information, we would advert to the assertions made in the writ petition. It is set forth in the writ petition that India, which is a vast country having large population, has few millions of illiterate adults and certain States, as per the 2011 Census, have more illiterates.

3. Referring to Section 6(1) of the Right to Information Act, 2005 (for brevity, ‘the Act’), it is urged that the illiterate persons and the visually impaired persons or persons afflicted by other kinds of disabilities are not in a position to get the information. It is contended that the provision contained in Section 6 suffers from unreasonable classification between visually impaired and visually abled persons and thereby invites the frown of Article 14 of the Constitution. It is further contended that certain provisions of the Act are not accessible to orthopaedically impaired persons, persons below the poverty line and persons who do not have any access to the internet. Though in the petition, it has been asseverated as regards the violation of Article 14 of the Constitution, yet the prayer is couched in a different manner and we are obliged to say so because we feel that there is no need or necessity to deal with the constitutional validity of Section 6 of the Act. In fact, it is further necessary to mention that in the course of hearing, the prayer was centered on getting the reliefs, namely, to direct the Union of India, the States and the Union Territories to provide an effective machinery for the enforcement of the fundamental right to have access to information of illiterate citizens and to provide effective machinery to visually impaired persons and such impaired persons who are unable to have access to the internet. That being the fact situation, we sought the assistance of Mr. K.K. Venugopal, learned Attorney General for India in the matter.

4. We have heard Mr. Aseer Jamal, the petitioner, who has appeared in-person and Mr. K.K. Venugopal, learned Attorney General for India. Though the chart prepared by Mr. Venugopal indicates the objections and the response, yet we intend to deal with it in a holistic manner.

5. The Statement of Objects and Reasons of the Act reads as follows:-

“An Act to provide for setting out the practical regime of right to information for citizens to secure access to information under the control of public authorities, in order to promote transparency and accountability in the working of every public authority, the constitution of a Central Information Commission and State Information Commissions and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.

WHEREAS the Constitution of India has established democratic Republic;

AND WHEREAS democracy requires an informed citizenry and transparency of information which are vital to its functioning and also to contain corruption and to hold Governments and their instrumentalities accountable to the governed;

AND WHEREAS revelation of information in actual practice is likely to conflict with other public interests including efficient operations of the Governments, optimum us