india

Updated: Oct 26, 2019 04:33 IST

The Centre curtailed the tenure of information commissioners in transparency panels across the country to three years in new Right to Information rules it notified on Thursday.

The new rules will be applicable on the new appointments.

The 2005 Act gave them a fixed tenure of five years or a retirement age of 65 years, whichever is earlier.

The new rules have given discretion to government to decide on allowances or service conditions not specifically covered by the 2019 rules which would be “binding”.

The salary of Chief Information Commissioner has been fixed at ~2.50 lakh while that of Information Commissioners at Rs 2, 25,000.

The government had amended the RTI Act, 2005, in July ending the parity enjoyed by CIC and Information Commissioners with Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioners on terms and conditions of their service.

However, the notification also mentioned that the Centre would have the power to relax any of these provisions with regard to any class or category of persons.

Some activists have expressed disappointment to the new rules.

“As the parity between the Information Commissions and the Election Commission has been downgraded to babu-level, it is unlikely that in a situation where the rule of law is not a very strongly embedded value, that senior babus will ever be hauled up for not complying with the RTI Act,” activist Venkatesh Nayak told news agency PTI.