Bangladesh has appointed three people to an institution whose principal responsibility is to make the government disclose information it might otherwise prefer to withhold.
The Information Commission is not a government publicity office. It does not exist to explain official policies, government projects, defend ministers or promote the achievements of an administration.
Its statutory responsibility is to enforce the public's right to information, investigate complaints, settle disputes over access to official records and hold public authorities accountable when they unlawfully refuse disclosure.
On Saturday, October 17, the government appointed Jahangirnagar University professor Nahreen Islam Khan as Bangladesh's first female chief information commissioner.
Two journalists, SAM Mahfuzur Rahman and Khan Mohammad Abul Hossain, were appointed information commissioners.
The appointments, made under Section 15(1) of the Right to Information Act, 2009, ended a prolonged leadership vacuum that had left the commission unable to exercise its central adjudicatory functions.
They also returned an important oversight institution to the control of appointees selected under a political government. The commission was created to operate independently of that government.
Whether it can do so is now the main question.
The Information Commission owes its existence to the Right to Information Act, enacted in 2009 during Sheikh Hasina's first year back in power.
The legislation gave citizens a statutory means to obtain information from public authorities. It also established a mechanism to challenge refusals.
The principle behind the formation of this body was that the information held by public institutions should not automatically belong to the institutions themselves.
A citizen can request records concerning public spending, procurement, development projects, administrative decisions or the delivery of government services, subject to exemptions specified by law.
Public authorities are generally required to respond within 20 working days. The period can extend to 30 working days when information must be collected from multiple units or authorities. Requests involving life, death, arrest or release require substantially faster responses.
When an authority refuses to disclose information, fails to respond or provides an inadequate answer, the applicant can pursue an appeal and subsequently seek intervention from the Information Commission.
The commission can investigate complaints, summon relevant officials, examine records, direct disclosure and impose penalties for specified violations. Its role is therefore different from that of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
The ministry communicates and administers government information policy. The commission is supposed to determine whether public bodies have complied with their legal disclosure obligations.
The commission may promote public awareness of the RTI Act, train officials and explain citizens' rights. These are statutory functions intended to improve access to information.
Acting as the government's press wing, however, is not one of its statutory mandates.
The difference becomes particularly important when a citizen seeks information that could embarrass a ministry or expose administrative irregularities. Or the information would challenge an official account.
In such cases, the commission must assess the lawfulness of disclosure or refusal, not the political consequences for the government.
Its independence is supported by statutory provisions, but its leadership is appointed through a process involving the political executive.
That creates a structural question about how independently commissioners can operate when their decisions concern the administration responsible for their appointments.
Let’s consider Mahfuzur Rahman's appointment.
Mahfuzur, a journalist who had been appointed as Prime Minister Tarique Rahman's speechwriter, was subsequently shifted to the Information Commission. His professional background does not disqualify him from serving.
But the move from a position associated with preparing the prime minister's speeches to an institution responsible for scrutinising government secrecy illustrates the importance of institutional separation.
The commission's legitimacy ultimately depends on whether it can apply the RTI Act impartially, including when information requests concern the prime minister's office or other powerful government institutions.
The Information Commission was established during a period when Bangladesh was introducing new legal mechanisms for transparency and administrative accountability.
The RTI Act was adopted in 2009, following earlier efforts to establish a legal right of access to public information.
The legislation provided for a three-member commission, including a chief information commissioner. Under Section 11, the commission is designated an independent statutory body.
Section 14 establishes a selection committee that includes a Supreme Court judge, the cabinet secretary, representatives of the ruling and opposition parties and a government-nominated representative from journalism or related fields.
The president appoints commissioners on the committee's recommendation. Commissioners serve for five years or until reaching 67, whichever comes first.
The arrangement provides some institutional safeguards. It does not entirely separate appointments from political influence. During Hasina's 15-year rule, the commission continued to exist, receive complaints and issue decisions.
Its record, however, attracted criticism from transparency campaigners who argued that formal independence had not translated into effective oversight of government institutions.
Transparency International Bangladesh has described the commission under the Awami League government as ineffective and has raised concerns about the appointment of former bureaucrats to positions intended to provide independent scrutiny.
During Hasina's government, Bangladesh faced repeated allegations of enforced disappearances, unlawful detention, restrictions on dissent and the suppression of politically sensitive information.
A United Nations human rights investigation published in February 2025 found reasonable grounds to believe that serious human rights violations, including acts potentially amounting to crimes against humanity, had been committed during the suppression of the 2024 protests.
Such findings illustrate the significance of access to official records, although the Information Commission is not a criminal investigative body and cannot independently prosecute human rights violations.
Its statutory role is narrower: ensuring that information covered by the RTI Act is disclosed in accordance with the law. That task was already constrained by broad exemptions, including those concerning national security, intelligence agencies and other protected categories of information.
Section 7 allows authorities to withhold specified information. Section 32 excludes certain security and intelligence organisations from much of the law's ordinary disclosure framework, subject to exceptions concerning corruption and human rights violations.
The result is a system in which the legal right to information coexists with substantial areas of official secrecy. The commission's operational problems became more visible after Hasina's fall in August 2024.
By September that year, its leadership had ceased functioning. The interim administration led by Muhammad Yunus did not appoint replacements during its roughly 18-month tenure.
The commission's complaint-hearing mechanism remained inactive. By 2025, campaigners were publicly demanding its reconstitution.
In September that year, Transparency International Bangladesh and other organisations called for an independent commission whose members would be selected on the basis of qualifications and without conflicts of interest.
TIB Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman warned against treating the institution as a destination for retired officials. At the same event, then Information Adviser Mahfuj Alam pledged that the commission would be made functional soon.
It was not reconstituted before the interim government left office in February 2026.
The BNP-led government subsequently inherited the vacancies. It took until October 17 to appoint the new commissioners.
Bangladesh's RTI legislation has performed considerably better in international legal assessments than its implementation has in practice.
The Global RTI Rating, maintained by the Centre for Law and Democracy and Access Info Europe, gave Bangladesh approximately 107 to 109 points out of 150, placing it 27th among 141 countries in a ranking cited by The Business Standard in March 2026.
The ranking measures the strength of the legal framework, not how readily government offices release information. The difference is substantial.
According to figures from the national RTI portal cited in that report, 27,673 information applications had been submitted.
Only 121 were recorded as having received responses. Another 139 were under process, while 24,487 had exceeded the legal response deadline.
An RTI request is supposed to follow a defined process. A citizen approaches the designated information officer of a public authority. The officer must respond within the prescribed period or provide legally valid grounds for refusing disclosure.
An applicant dissatisfied with the response can appeal within the administrative hierarchy. If that process fails, the applicant can bring a complaint before the Information Commission.
Under the law, the commission is ordinarily required to dispose of complaints within 45 days, with a possible extension bringing the maximum period to 75 days. The commission can order disclosure and impose penalties on responsible officials.
Under the original 2009 legislation, the fine for specified violations was 50 taka per day, subject to a maximum of 5,000 taka. The interim government amended the RTI Act through an ordinance in February 2026.
The amendment broadened the definition of information to cover additional digital records and increased penalties to 100 taka per day, with a maximum of 10,000 taka.
But the changes did not resolve several longstanding disputes about the scope of disclosure. Official note sheets, which record internal administrative discussions and recommendations, remained excluded from the definition of information.
Transparency advocates argue that this limits public access to the reasoning behind government decisions.
The Tottho Odhikar Forum submitted 37 reform recommendations in 2025, including proposals to bring political parties and more private organisations within the law's scope, strengthen access to official records and prevent prolonged vacancies in the commission.
Those broader proposals were not incorporated into the amendment. The exclusion of political parties is particularly relevant to the commission's independence.
Political parties exercise considerable influence over public administration when they form governments. Yet their internal finances and decision-making are not subject to the same disclosure framework as public authorities.
The RTI Act also operates alongside older secrecy provisions and restrictions on access to sensitive government records. Consequently, the commission must distinguish between information that is legitimately exempt and information that officials are withholding without sufficient legal grounds.
That is an adjudicatory function. It requires commissioners to evaluate the government's reasons for refusing disclosure rather than simply accept them.
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