With the adoption of the 19th Amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution, citizens gained a constitutional right to access information held by public authorities. The state and all public authorities defined in the Right to Information (RTI) Act No. 12 of 2016 are responsible for upholding this right, legally obligated to facilitate citizens in claiming it without hindrance.
Citizens can access information through two primary methods: by submitting specific requests to public authorities, known as reactive disclosure, or through proactive publication, where authorities publish information without requiring requests.
Our RTI law robustly supports reactive disclosure, outlining precise procedures for information requests, compliance time frames, exemptions (unless justified by overriding public interest), dispute resolution mechanisms, and penalties for non-compliance. This emphasis has led many stakeholders to view individual requests as the primary means for citizens to exercise their right to information.
In contrast, the Indian RTI law places greater emphasis on proactive disclosure. Initially, our law required only biannual RTI implementation reports and advance details from ministers regarding specific projects. Beyond these, it lacked substantial provisions for proactive information sharing.
The Indian law mandates that public authorities proactively publish specified categories of information, essential for institutional transparency, within a 120-day timeframe. Recognizing the need for stronger proactive directives in our legislation, the Right to Information Commission advised the Minister to enact Regulation No. 20, which outlines minimum proactive disclosure requirements. This regulation took effect on February 3, 2017. The Commission utilized its authority under Section 15(d) of the RTI Act to direct public authorities to provide information in a standardized format.
However, even with legal requirements in place, India’s proactive information disclosure remains weak, as noted by a government task force in 2011. They identified gaps in Section 4’s details and called for a compliance mechanism to ensure adherence. This underscores that without a unified strategy and effective compliance measures, public authorities are unlikely to meet their proactive disclosure obligations.
Proactive disclosure involves public authorities actively disseminating information rather than waiting for citizens to request it piecemeal. The extent of proactive publication reflects an authority’s commitment to accountability and transparency—key goals of our RTI law. Before this legislation, public authorities lacked effective transparency mechanisms. Enhancing proactive disclosure is likely to boost public confidence in governmental transparency and accountability more than reactive measures alone.
Fulfilling citizens’ right to information means making data accessible to the public, not just to individual requesters. Unlike the Indian RTI law, Regulation No. 20 does not specify compliance timeframes. Nevertheless, its comprehensive information requirements can help public authorities demonstrate genuine transparency and efficiency. The government should develop a strategic approach to ensure compliance with Regulation No. 20, beginning with state sector authorities. Citizens and organizations that support reactive disclosure should equally prioritize proactive information sharing.
Mutual Benefits
Proactive disclosure informs citizens about available services and how to access them, promoting equitable awareness. It also enhances information flow within government bodies, breaking down silos and clarifying the roles of various organizations. Increased visibility improves public perception and facilitates collaboration among different agencies, enhancing overall service efficiency.
Governments must be accountable for their actions and spending. Voluntary disclosure of financial information signifies transparency and deters corruption, enabling better public scrutiny of expenditures and procurement processes.
Addressing each information request individually consumes significant time and resources. Proactive disclosure reduces these burdens, making information available to all citizens, fostering trust in government, and decreasing the need for individual requests.
Public authorities should strive to publish all disclosable information, fostering a culture of proactive transparency among staff to enhance operational efficiency.
Citizen Engagement in Policymaking
Proactive information dissemination encourages dialogue among government, citizens, and businesses, essential for effective policymaking. Citizens need easy access to information on laws, current strategies, and policy options. This information can be shared through newsletters, forums, blogs, and online platforms, facilitating high levels of engagement.
Policymakers should report back to citizens on consultation outcomes, summarizing stakeholder positions and proposed actions. Web-based public consultations, particularly for legislation and major policy decisions, can further enhance citizen involvement.
Government information is a vital public resource, akin to infrastructure such as education and health systems. Increasing proactive information publication is a fundamental obligation of any democratic government committed to empowering citizens to make informed decisions.
Innovative Information Reuse
Access to public sector information promotes transparency and accountability while offering economic benefits. Allowing royalty-free reuse of public information encourages innovation and the development of valuable knowledge products. Public sector information, including data from various government agencies, can be creatively repackaged for educational and cultural purposes.
Means of Publication
Public authorities can utilize diverse methods for proactive disclosure, including publications, gazette notifications, media announcements, and online platforms. The Internet presents unparalleled opportunities for information sharing, with a significant portion of the Sri Lankan population now online.
While many public authorities have websites, their use for proactive publication varies considerably. A survey by Verité Research in December 2017 found that online proactive disclosure was limited and inconsistent across public bodies.
An effective website reflects an organization’s commitment to transparency. Users should access information in their preferred language, and web content should be engaging and clear. Tools like FAQs, feedback systems, and multimedia can enhance user experience.
Towards a Common Strategy
To ensure citizens can effectively exercise their right to information, public authorities must adopt policies, procedures, and resources that facilitate this access. A coherent government strategy to improve proactive disclosure across all public authorities is essential. Regulations, such as Sections 8 and 9 of the RTI Act and Regulation No. 20, outline the obligations that must be met.
Establishing a structured Publication Scheme, as suggested in Regulation No. 20, can serve as a common framework for public authorities to meet their proactive disclosure obligations. Countries with successful RTI implementations often use similar schemes to organize and clarify what information is published.
What is a Publication Scheme?
A Publication Scheme is a structured list of information that a public authority should make available for public perusal. The Publication Scheme should provide the details of:
- the categories of information the public authority will proactively make available, in keeping with the principle of maximum possible disclosure facilitated by the RTI Act and its regulations;
- how the information can be accessed. Is it through the website of the public authority, or as hard copies, other formats, or as printed publications;
- a list of material available only in hard copy including in the printed form or in other formats for examination. This list should be published on the website;
- terms on which the information will be made available, including any charges for printed material;
- any third party copyrighted material included in the Publication Scheme for which permission to reuse beyond what is already allowed by copyright law should be sought from the copyright holder;
- the alternative formats in which information is available; and
- how to make a complaint when information included in the Publication Scheme is not available, false or has not been updated. (Regulation No. 20. Gazetted under the RTI Act enables citizens to complain the Head of the public authority if the proactively disclosed information is improper and/or false and/or has not been updated. The citizen can request the RTI commission to intervene if the public authority fails to rectify it.)
The Publication Scheme should include a summary describing the documents, together with details on how to obtain access to the information whenever the disclosed information is available only in hard copy. All ‘significant’ information should be listed under the Publication Scheme unless there is a good reason for withholding it. There are a number of factors which can assist public authorities to determine the significance of information held by them. Among them are the following:
- information experiencing repeated demand by the requesters or where there is a good likelihood of a request for it.
- whether the information is required to be published by law. (The sections 8 and 9 of the RTI Act and its regulation No. 20 describes the obligatory information to publish under the law);
- information relating to problems currently faced by the government which the citizens could help resolve;
- the information relating to future challenges, such as national energy requirements, food security, disaster management and events associated with climate change etc;
- whether the information will facilitate industry development, efficient markets and growth in trade and commerce;
- documents tabled in Parliament and relevant judgements interpreting laws related to the organisations’ tasks;
- whether the information assists members of the public to identify what information is held by the organisation, such as an information asset register or various indexes;
- whether publication would promote public authority’s accountability, such as reasons for certain decisions, governance arrangements and the achievement of key performance targets;
- statistical information and data sets that could inform the researchers, journalists and development partners about the organisation’s policy, program work and performance;
- whether the information relates to a program or initiative that was the subject of a media release, debates of legislative bodies and local councils or highlighted in a corporate plan or strategy;
- plans that underpin the achievement of the organisation’s strategic and operational goals; and
- whether the information promotes people’s well-being.
What is considered significant will likely to change over time as circumstances faced by the country and government priorities might change? All efforts should be made to ensure that the information included is accurate, in terms of what has already been published, or what may be published on the relevant topic.
The Publication Scheme should make provisions to publish the information provided in response to RTI requests which could be of interest to others.
It is particularly important for the Publication Scheme to list the organisation’s key documents such as annual reports, strategic plans and budget highlights and any registers that the organisation is required to maintain by a law. For example, section 8 of the RTI Act requires the public authorities to produce and to make available copies of its biannual reports for inspection by the public. Similarly, section 9 of the RTI Act requires the ministers to prior disclose details of projects categorised in the Act.
All public authorities should make available their Publication Scheme through the organisation’s website for public perusal. It is important to update Publication Schemes as well as the actual disclosure of information to include new information, for example, when:
- new or revised legislation is passed;
- new or revised policies are introduced;
- new publications are released;
- new initiatives or projects commenced;
- information is updated; or
- the public authority is restructured.
Once finalised, it is important to publish the Publication Scheme on the organisation’s website and in other accessible formats for public scrutiny.
At a minimum, a Publication Scheme could be structured in line with the different categories of information prescribed in the Regulation no. 20 gazetted under the RTI Act. The following is a template for such a publication scheme. In this template, the information categories mentioned in the Regulation no 20 are re-casted to give the Publication Scheme a public service-minded orientation.
The Publication Scheme of (name of the public authority)
We are committed to providing the citizens with greater access to information in order to fulfil our obligations towards their constitutional right to access information held by public authorities as defined by the Right to Information Act No 13 of 2016.
Our Publication Scheme describes information that is routinely published through our website and in other formats. The information is grouped as described under the following categories as prescribed in Regulation No 20 gazetted under the RTI Act:
- About us (who we are and why we exist)
- Information about our organisation and its mission and vision.
- Our functions and powers.
- Our location (indicated in the google map), opening hours, contact details including of our branches.
- Our Organisation (How are we organised)
- Our organisational structure (organigram) and the number of employees in each division/department and their grades and gender.
- Names, designations, duties and contact details of our executive grade officials.
- Remunerations, emoluments and allowances of our executive grade officials.
- Our ancillary organisations, their functions and links to their websites.
- Our operations and decision-making process (The way we decide and work)
- Rules, regulations, instructions and manuals and other documents which are used by our officers and employees in the discharge of their functions, duties and exercise of power.
- Our strategic plan.
- Our decisions and formal acts which directly affect the public.
- Data and documents, we used as the basis for each such decision.
- Our decision-making processes, the internal criteria we use for judgement; the procedures we administer.
- Reports on our completed/ongoing projects.
- Whom do we consult, the mechanisms for our consultations?
- Our Public Services (What services do we offer)
- A description of the services we offer to the public, including related advice, guidance, manuals, forms, fee structures, deadlines, booklets, leaflets, and media releases.
- How to access our public services.
- Our Policies and legislation (Policies and legislations guiding us)
- Our current written policies and protocols we administer for delivering our functions and responsibilities.
- Information relating to our strategic and performance requirements, including plans, assessments, inspections, and reviews.
- The facts and other documents and data being used as a basis for formulating our policies and priorities.
- Key legislative enactments we are bound by.
- Regulations and circulars, we must follow.
- Reports submitted by us to the Parliament.
- Relevant judgements related to our functions made by the Supreme Court.
- Our Public Consultations (How the public can engage with us)
- Our meetings which are open to the public and how to attend them.
- Live to a stream of our important meetings.
- Our online discussion forums.
- Our presence on social media platforms.
- Our complaint mechanisms.
- Our Public Procurement and Subsidies (How we procure and the subsidies we provide)
- Information on subsidies we provide/manage; objective, amounts and implementation targets relating to subsidies.
- Information on the beneficiaries of our subsidies.
- Our purchasing procedures, which sets out how our officers will buy goods and services.
- Public procurement information and detailed information on our tendering process.
- Copies of our contracts.
- Reports on completed contracts.
- Details of our ongoing contracts including:
- description of the items/Works for which bids were invited;
- total number of bids received;
- name of the successful bidder/s;
- the amount at which the contract/s were awarded;
- targeted date of completion; and
- in the case of a contract awarded to a foreign principal the details of the local agent.
- Our budgets, expenditure and finances (what we spend and how we spend)
- Our projected itemised budget for the current year.
- Our itemised disbursements in the previous year.
- Reports on audits carried out by Auditor General/designated auditors, by the year of audit.
- The information we hold (information held by us and how to access them)
- Information held and maintained by us as required by the law.
- Our Information index: the index of documents, reports, lists, registers, and databases held or produced by us with relevant hyperlinks if accessible from our website.
- Our product samples and how to obtain them.
- Our printed publications: titles, year of publication, whether they are free of charge or for sale and available online to download.
- Contact details of our Information Officer and model application forms for RTI requests and appeals.
- The Fee schedule for obtaining information as determined by the Right to Information Commission.
- The designated officer and contact details if you have a complaint concerning your RTI request.
- Our Ministers report published as per Section 8 of the RTI Act.
- Annual reports submitted by us to the Right to Information Commission in accordance with Section 10 of the RTI Act.
- Our reactive disclosures (Information we provided following RTI requests)
- The list of information we have already supplied as responses to RTI Act and are likely to be interesting to others.
- Hyperlinks are embedded in the list if they are available and accessible through the website.
- Our foreign-funded projects above USD 100,000 and locally funded above Rs. 500,000 (the projects we intend to implement)
- Notification of project commencement.
- Pre-feasibility and feasibility studies of projects.
- Terms and conditions of investment (including expected costs, benefits and rate of return).
- Detailed project costs, including disaggregated budgets.
- Project timeline.
- Arrangements to visit project sites through a formal RTI request, if applicable.
Terms of access and reuse of information
Unless stated otherwise, all digitalised information in our Publication Scheme is available free of charge on our website and can be reused. All information disclosed under our Publication Scheme, barring third-party copyrighted information, is subject to a royalty-free, perpetual, non-exclusive licence to reuse the information. Reuse of our information includes copying, publishing, translating, adapting, distributing or otherwise using in any medium, mode or format for any lawful purpose.
Where possible, the information is directly linked and available for you to download. If you are having difficulties in accessing any of these documents, please contact us so that we can assist you by providing the information in an alternative format.
Complaints about the publication scheme
You have the right to complain if information identified in our Publication Scheme is not available, improper/false or outdated.
Please do address such complaints to the Head of our organisation with a copy to our information officer. You can request the Right to Information Commission to intervene if we fail to respond to your complaint or to rectify the deficiencies you pointed out.
The contact details you provide when complaining will be used purely for the purpose of investigating and addressing your complaint and may be referred to relevant organisational units or regions for action and response.
We value your comments and any feedback you provide will be used to make improvements to our Publication Scheme. You can contact us at any time to provide feedback.
Last updated (indicate the date)
Once such a Publication Scheme is in place, a steering committee led by senior managers of the organisation could oversee its implementation and make periodic revisions. This committee should have the ability to ensure that effective structures, supports and resources are in place to facilitate the implementation of the publication scheme. Initially, the committee can assess and take stock of the current status of proactive disclosure of information. Identifying information and the form in which they should be made available to the public could be guided by this steering committee with due regards to exceptions defined in Section 5 of the RTI Act.
Based on respective publication schemes the Ministries could collect data to assess the levels of proactive disclosure of public authorities coming under its purview. This would enable the Ministries to identify which organisations have been successful in rolling out proactive disclosure Publication Schemes, which are facing problems, and consequently to identify the underlying reasons behind lack of compliance and how to overcome them.
Investing in Information Digitalisation
Our RTI law requires every public authority to maintain all its records duly catalogued and indexed in such form as is consistent with its operational requirements to facilitate the right to access of information[7]. As a matter of routing, all public authorities should move towards to make available all the new documents produced or commissioned by them in accessible digital formats. All such documents should have searchable metadata such as the keywords, author, publication date and the publisher etc.
Unlike ours, the Indian RTI law requires public bodies to computerise all records which can be transformed into digital formats and to make them accessible all over the country through a computerised network. The section 4 of the Indian law requires to “…. ensure that all records that are appropriate to be computerised are, within a reasonable time and subject to availability of resources, computerised and connected through a network all over the country on different systems so that access to such records is facilitated.” [8]
It is more likely that much disclosable information held by our public authorities are in hard copies and other more perishable formats. Therefore, every public authority should devise its own action plan to identify and incrementally digitalise important information, beginning from the most sought out documents by the public, including from the archives.
Digitisation is the process of converting information from a physical format into a digital one. Section 7(3) of the RTI Act, requires all public authorities to preserve all their records for a period of 10-12 years. The digitalisation of documents with a proper system in place to manage them would make it easy to preserve, index and to readily access information.
When planning for information digitisation, each public authority will have to determine how to maximise the utility of existing resources and technical facilities to accomplish it. The information digitalisation plan should address the need to provide documents in accessible and searchable formats such as Word (.doc), text-searchable Portable Document Format (.pdf) or Rich Text Format (.rtf) etc with embedded metadata tags to identify information. When choosing information for digitisation, the public authorities should aim to build on an initial base of core classes of information that meets pressing public information needs, gradually increasing the volume and scope of material released.
Many government agencies produce various types of useful data. The veracity of the data sets has to be checked before they are released to the public domain. When releasing digitised data sets the public authority should:
make datasets available in open formats such as Excel, Comma-Separated Values (.csv) and Extensible Mark-up Language (.xml)
- follow metadata standards to easily identify and locate the information.
- have clear usage licences.
- publish data as soon as possible after collection.
- not compromise intellectual property rights or commercial confidentiality, and advice of data quality and length of time data will continue to be produced.
In some cases, the public authority may have to allocate additional resources or even to outsource the information digitalisation when volumes are larger, or when the task cannot be accomplished in-house. This would mean the need for sufficient budgetary allocations to improve proactive disclosure and information digitisation. Large information digitalisation programmes would encourage entrepreneurs to establish information digitalisation businesses. Multiple benefits of proactive disclosure and their potentials to increase transparency and accountability justify investments in incremental digitisation of information held by public authorities.
Issues of Compliance
The government cannot be transparent and accountable unless its top leaders are willing to perceive proactive disclosure of information as an important pre-condition to establishing open government systems. A lack of political will to perceive as such may be driven by a number of factors including a fear of public scrutiny; fear of exposure of the failure of government programmes and policies; the threat to personal interests or increased vulnerability to political opponents. However, the alleviation of such fears depends mostly on the readiness of leaders to genuinely engage with the citizens in an open dialogue to discuss important challenges they face. Proactive sharing of information help builds the trust between the government and the citizens to engage in a constructive dialogue. It also generates a mutual understanding to face common challenges and to develop better-informed policies to address them. Open systems of government are possible only when leaders believe in public consultations and treat citizens as a source of inspiration instead of relying purely on leaders’ own superiority and perceived wisdom.
It might also be the case that some organisations want to increase their transparency with minimal efforts from their current practices stating that they are more than happy to respond to individual information requests. Experience in working with less democratic regimes often make many bureaucrats believe non-disclosure as a good sign of their authority. For them, transparency and public scrutiny weaken their power and influence. Compulsory transparency training programmes designed for executive grade officers of the affected entities might give an opportunity to address such attitudes.
The momentum to foster a culture of transparency and accountability needs to come from both the right holders and the duty bearers, namely three sets of players are important here: the government leaders and ministers; senior and middle-level public officials and the civil society. Without the total consent and active participation of all three players, the road to transparency and accountability will be merely a set of words mentioned in the preamble of our RTI Act.
It is paramount that political leaders and public authorities understand why proactive disclosure of information is more efficient. To that end, in formulating the overall strategy, both current publishing habits of organisations and the likely demand for information from the public must be accounted for. The compliance should appear to be realistic from the public authority’s viewpoint, with additional resources, if required, in place. Complying for other reasons is more likely to lead to a superficial result where obligations are met at a bare minimum out of sheer necessity to meet the requirements prescribed by the regulation 20, rather than a genuine desire to satisfy the expected outcomes of the RTI such as transparency and accountability.
According to the RTI law the responsibility of effective implementation of the provisions of the Act and its regulations squarely lies with the nodal agency, the Ministry of the Minister assigned with the subject of mass media. To that end, the establishment of a transparency certification by the nodal agency as an effective compliance incentive for the government entities will be useful. At least by adhering to a common Publication Scheme, the nodal agency could award a base level of certification upon full compliance with all the proactive disclosure requirements mentioned in the RTI Act and its regulations. Such certification, for instance, could publicly display on the entity’s website. The nodal agency can publish a compliance rating of all entities, as established by a monitoring process, which could help to hold entities accountable to the public. Thus, quality and quantity of proactive disclosure of information should become an important indicator of the public authorities’ performance excellence.
Reactive disclosure, which is about disclosing information as a response to an individual request, enables partial fulfilment of the right to information. The citizens are able to fully enjoy their right to information only when proactive disclosure of information becomes the standard norm of our right to information.
Wijayananda Jayaweera
The writer is the former Director of the UNESCO’s International Programme for Communication Development (IPDC)
[1] The Gazette of Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. No. 2004/66 – FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 03, 2017
[2] Implementation of Recommendations of Task Force for Strengthening Compliance with Provisions for Suo Motu/Proactive Disclosures under Section 4 of the RTI Act, 2005. – Note for the Committee of Secretaries from the Cabinet dated 10th July 2012
[3] Implementation of Recommendations of Task Force for Strengthening Compliance with Provisions for Suo Motu/Proactive Disclosures under Section 4 of the RTI Act, 2005. – Note for the Committee of Secretaries from the Cabinet dated 10th July 2012
[4] Government Printer (2017) The Gazette of the Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. No. 2004/66 – FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 03, 2017, Colombo
[5] http://www.trc.gov.lk/images/pdf/statis_q2201824082018.pdf (accessed on 06 Oct 2018)
[6] Verité Research Pvt Ltd. (2017), Online Proactive Disclosure under the RTI Act in Sri Lanka: A Monitoring Framework and Baseline Assessment. Final report, World Bank, Colombo
[7] Section 7(1) Right to Information Act No 12 of 2016, Sri Lanka
[8] Section 4 (a) Right to Information Act No. 22 of 2005, India
JAYAVOICE 