Four charts that show it’s not safe to be an RTI activist in India

Being an RTI user or activist in India is fraught with dangers. Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI), an NGO based-out of New Delhi, has compiled data of the number of individuals who have been allegedly attacked and harassed for seeking information under the RTI Act since its implementation in 2005. 

Since there are no official statistics available, the data has been compiled from reports published in the English online media space. 

The report was first published in 2013, and has been updated on regular intervals since then. The last update was in April 2015.

"While gathering data, one of the major challenges is getting in touch with families of the victims. Though most of the times we corroborate the reports with activists in the specific states, what is most difficult is to establish is whether in specific cases the attack or murder was because of the individual seeking information under the Act," says Venkatesh Nayak, Programme Co-ordinator, Access to Information Programme, CHRI. 

However, the author of the report did not come across reports of such attacks from Kerala and Sikkim.