Should PPP be brought under the right to information?

As the Right to Information Act completes its seventh year of implementation in India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's concern about the transparency law being applied to public-private partnerships (PPP) highlights that there is still a long way to go before the legislation is implemented in true spirit.

Pointing to the grey area in the law under which PPPs fall, Singh raised concern about how much information these entities be obliged to disclose under the RTI. " Blanket extension of the Act to such bodies may discourage private enterprises to enter into partnerships with the public sector entity. A blanket exclusion on the other hand may harm the cause of accountability of public officials," is the view he held.

It is however, worth questioning why PPP projects designed towards public benefit should be exempt from the same level of scrutiny and accountability that public bodies are put under. Aren't private bodies after all brought into such projects under the pretext that they will bring in greater efficiency, accountability and monitoring? Be it infrastructure projects such as flyovers, public transport or roads, water distribution networks or healthcare, PPPs are making a foray into areas that are traditionally considered the responsibility of the state. Yet, basic status reports of such projects, their accounts or dealings are not put into public domain.

A report Public-Private Partnerships in water sector by voluntary organization Manthan Adhyayan Kendra, Madhya Pradesh in February 2010 had pointed out that such projects 'demand' and get secrecy on the grounds of their commercial aspects and owing to them being for-profit organizations. "Citizens have serious troubles accessing information about such projects," it stated pointing out that the barriers deny the common people who are impacted by the project, access to crucial information about the project. It also introduces a degree of skepticism about PPP mechanisms itself.