State the objectives of the Right to Information Act, 2005.

The Right to Information Act, 2005 (Act/RTI Act), confers on all citizens the right to information. The Act provides for setting out the practical regime of right to information for citizens to secure access to information held by public authorities to promote transparency and accountability in the working of every public authority. In the case of Anjali Bhardwaj and Others vs. Union of India and Others in Writ Petition (Civil) No. 436 of 2018 Judgement dated February 15, 2019 , the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India in Paragraph 18, 19 and 68 observed that there is a definite link between right to information and good governance. In fact, the RTI Act itself lays emphasis on good governance and recognises that it is one of the objectives which the said Act seeks to achieve. The RTI Act would reveal that four major elements/objectives required to ensure good governance are: (i) greater transparency in functioning of public authorities; (ii) informed citizenry for promotion of partnership between citizens and the Government in decision making process; (iii) improvement in accountability and performance of the Government; and (iv) reduction in corruption in the Government departments. The right to information, therefore, is not only a constitutional right of the citizens but there is now a legislation in the form of RTI Act which provides a legal regime for people to exercise their fundamental right to information and to access information from public authorities. The very preamble of the Act captures the importance of this democratic right which reads as "democracy requires an informed citizenry and transparency of information which are vital to its functioning and also to contain corruption and to hold Governments and their instrumentalities accountable to the governed. This Act is enacted not only to sub-serve and ensure freedom of speech. On proper implementation, it has the potential to bring about good governance which is an integral part of any vibrant democracy. Attaining good governance is also one of the visions of the Constitution.