The Talk
Aruna Roy pioneered and led the struggle to bring in transparency in public life. Her, and her team’s efforts, led to the passage of the Right to Information Act.
In this brilliant Talk, Aruna Roy explains the importance of information and its criticality in the functioning of democracy.
PS : This talk has no video.
Aruna Roy, Political and Social activist
Ms Roy is an Indian social activist who co-founded the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathana (MKSS), a social and grassroots organization for the empowerment of workers and peasants. It is a major civil rights movement in India and played a crucial role in the establishment of the Right to Information Act (RTI). She is also served as a civil servant in the Indian Administrative Service before deciding to dedicate herself fully to social and political campaigns. It was while working in the Administrative Service that she was exposed to the level of corruption within the Indian bureaucracy. She became aware of the problems of the poor and realized that in spite of the government’s endeavors to help the poor, little help was actually reaching them. Disturbed by the current state of affairs, she decided to do something about it. Fully aware of the fact that there was not much she could do as a government officer, she quit her job to join her husband, a fellow social activist, in his efforts to help the poor. Eventually she founded the MKSS along with other social activists like Nikhil Dey and Shankar Singh. She was awarded the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership.
