Preventing abuse ......................................................................... Against this backdrop, is the almost universal position of political parties which refuse to give information at least on their funding to be accepted meekly? No, because at stake behind the demand for public disclosure of political finances are two important considerations: prevention of abuse (by using soiled money); the need to promote healthy political competition which requires sharing the sources and quantum of funding of each party with the voter. Undoubtedly, the stalwarts in the RTI fraternity have done a great job by bringing the subject of political finance into prominence. That conceded, India now needs a law to bring it on a par with progressive countries world-wide. That means mandating disclosure and reporting rules that provide clarity about political funds — their sources and their utilisation. We need a body akin to what has been set up in the U.S. under the Federal Election Campaign Act 1974 which created an enforcement agency called the Federal Election Commission. This body supervises all financial transactions by political bodies that have solicited or spent money to support or defeat federal candidates. The organisation verifies all reports presented, and discloses the same to the public and the media. Ideally our Election Commission should be empowered to do exactly this, by law. If this were done there is no need for individual parties to give responses under RTI.
Posted on: Tue, 23 Jul 2013 02:10:17 +0000