What's new on RTI Wiki — RTI Wiki Citizen Guide 2026

The change index for RTI Wiki — fresh rulings added to the case-law corpus, SEO-upgraded pillar pages, new CPD modules, and amendment-tracking updates. Curated reverse-chronologically. Bookmark this page if you want a fast pulse on the Indian RTI landscape without subscribing to every individual article.

• Section 19 / 20 / 22 / 24 framework pages added - five new PIO/FAA pages live: Section 19(1) First Appeal Guide, Section 19(3) Second Appeal to CIC/SIC, Section 20 Penalty - Rs 250/day, Section 22 Overriding Effect, Section 24 Exempt Organisations. Full SEO template on each (Quick Answer, disclosure table, statutory text, case law, FAQs, drafting template where applicable, Next Steps).
• State-guide to case-corpus cross-linking - 37 state / UT guides now carry a “Notable RTI rulings” section pulling 1-8 relevant rulings from the 362-case corpus. Strengthens the state-to-case-law graph, improving SEO and user discovery.

• Corpus at 362 — scraper queue promoted (+25 more) — another 25 CIC decisions (2021-2023) promoted from the queue into main corpus. Subject spread: Income Tax, RBI, Delhi Police, Dept of Space, CVC, CBI, BPCL, ICSI, Customs, GST, Home Affairs. 60 queue entries remain for future promotion. * Sitemap refreshed — 822 URLs indexed — full DokuWiki indexer run + sitemap rebuild now surfaces all 323 case pages, 7 new Section 8 framework pages, and 2 tool stubs. Sitemap declared in robots.txt (https://righttoinformation.wiki/sitemap.xml) for Google next-crawl.
• Section 4(1)(b) Proactive Disclosure framework page — new Section 4(1)(b) — 17 Categories guide. Big SEO target (proactive disclosure RTI India). Full 17-category table, self-audit checklist, citizen enforcement playbook, Section 18/19/20 compliance path, case law, FAQs, Next Steps.
• Image alt-text SEO audit — 12 machine-generated alt texts rewritten across pages (e.g. File Rti Online India - RTI Wiki → descriptive H1-based alt). All image refs now use descriptive keyword-rich alt text for image-search indexing.

• Corpus 337 — scraper queue promoted (+25 cases) — 25 CIC decisions from 2022-2023 editorially promoted from the scraped-queue into the main corpus. Subject spread: RBI / EPFO / Income Tax / Customs / GST / CBI / Delhi Police / NPCIL / IAF / Defence / NHAI / Dept of Space / ONGC / BPCL / CVC / ICSI / Animal Welfare Board / Ministry of Cooperation. All marked needsReview=true for editorial polish; 85 queue entries remaining for future promotion.
• Section 8 framework cluster completed — seven new PIO decision-framework pages live: Section 8(1)(a) sovereignty, Section 8(1)(b) contempt, Section 8(1)(c) parliamentary privilege, Section 8(1)(d) commercial confidence, Section 8(1)(f) foreign government, Section 8(1)(g) life and source identity, Section 8(1)(h) investigation; plus full build-out of Section 8(1)(i) cabinet papers. Each ~800-1000 words with Quick Answer, disclosure table, case law, FAQs, Next Steps.
• Residual broken-link cleanup — created tools:rti-generator-app and tools:first-appeal-app stubs; patched CPD login and join links to DokuWiki native URL syntax; added 2 missing case entries (Madras HC PIO Section 20 penalty 2020, Gujarat HC co-operative societies 2019); fixed Section 8(1)(e) and (i) sub-clause anchor references on framework pages.

• LegalCase JSON-LD on all 310 case pages — Schema.org LegalCase structured data (court, date, plaintiff, defendant, citation, landmark flag, external source URL) now injected per case via meta.html. Rich-result eligibility for the entire case-law corpus. Article + BreadcrumbList + LegalCase emit cleanly on /cases/*; other pages unaffected.

• SEO rollout to 10 high-traffic pages — Quick Answer boxes, disclosure tables, People-Also-Ask FAQs and Next-Steps traffic-distribution blocks added to: Why RTI gets rejected, File RTI Online, PIO Reply Guide, 25 RTI Questions, §8(1)(j) framework, §8(1)(e) fiduciary, FAA speaking-order, §7(2) deemed refusal, Personal problems, Top 20 RTI questions.

• Case-law corpus expanded to 310 curated rulings — +100 new entries across three batches (v8/v9/v10). New coverage: SIC decisions from Haryana, Assam, HP, Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, MP, Bihar, UP, Rajasthan, Tripura, Manipur, Nagaland; tribunal rulings (CAT, AFT, NCDRC); North-East HC rulings (Meghalaya, Mizoram, Arunachal); emerging themes — DPDP 2025 prospectivity, ONDC §2(h), PM Gati Shakti §4(1)(b), Faceless Assessment anonymity, Ayush drug approvals, post-Electoral-Bonds political-party donations.
• Third Party / §11 page rewritten for Featured Snippets — Third Party in RTI Act — Section 11 Rules, Example and Step-by-Step Guide. New: Quick Answer box, disclosure table, 5-step process flow, People-Also-Ask FAQs, traffic-distribution Next Steps block.
• Site-wide broken-link fix — 138 namespace-relative Related links across 63 pages in sub-namespaces now resolve correctly (prefixed with ‎:‎ for root-absolute resolution).
• Homepage SEO snippet intro — 58-word snippet-ready first paragraph now sits above the fold on /start and /act; og/twitter descriptions decoupled from hashtag pollution.

• IK scraper feed — 70 new 2023/2022/2021 CIC docs queued for editorial review at /home/bighelpers/wiki/conf/cases/scraped-queue.json (110 total waiting). * Quotable snippets download — 40 landmark rulings as 2-line quotable blocks, in plain-text / JSON / CSV / printable A4 HTML. For First Appeal / Second Appeal / writ citations.
• Citation graph — overruled by, overruled, distinguished — every case page now surfaces “Overruled by / modified by”, “This ruling overruled / modified”, and “Distinguished by later rulings” blocks where applicable.
• Case Citation Formatter — new interactive tool: enter parties + citation + court + date, get 4 formatted citation variants.
• §8 Classifier, RTI Fee Calculator, Timeline Calculator — three interactive tools (pure JS, no login).
• State guides — seven live: MH, KA, TN, DL, KL, UP, GJ, plus BR, WB, MP.
• Blog posts — 22 April 2026 — Section 20 penalty, RTI against a government officer — can they retaliate?, RTI timelines cheat-sheet, First vs Second Appeal, DPDP 2025 before/after, 10 SC rulings every PIO must know.
• Scraper-assisted expansion pipeline — /home/bighelpers/wiki/bin/ik-scraper.py + promote-queue script staged; editorial-review workflow for growth to 500+ cases over 2026.
• Case-law corpus at 210 cases — 40 landmarks, 32 courts (1975-2025). Search the corpus →

• Case-law database now covers 160 rulings across 23 courts — Supreme Court, every major High Court, the Central Information Commission and 10 State Information Commissions. Every case has an editorial ratio, sub-section tags, an outcome classification and a “Similar cases in the corpus” block computed via tf-idf cosine similarity.
• Citation graph live on all case pages — each case shows “This case cites” and “Later rulings that cite this case”. 53 editorial citation links wired.
• Deep-link search — /cases/search now supports URL-param pre-filtering. Every case detail page deep-links to filtered sub-searches by court, Section, and landmark flag.
• Section 8(1)(j) after DPDP 2025 framework — SEO-upgraded with a 40-word direct answer, side-by-side amendment comparison table, and FAQ + HowTo JSON-LD schemas.
• File RTI online — 12-step 2026 guide — upgraded with a Featured-Snippet-friendly direct answer, FAQ and HowTo JSON-LD.
• First Appeal timelines — SEO-upgraded with direct answer + FAQ/HowTo schema.
• CPD Course LMS live at /cpd/app — 12 modules, per-module quizzes with 70% pass threshold, 15-minute timed final exam (3 attempts max), a Coursera-style honor-code gate, and a printable certificate with unique verification serial.
• Profile revamp — badges showcase + recent-activity feed on /profile, populated from server-side CPD state, subscriptions and activity records.
• Forum Phase 2 — cross-user reactions (👍 ❤ 💡) persisted server-side; forum comments now round-trip to the article's own Discussion section.

• Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act amended by Section 44(3) of the DPDP Act, 2023, notified 14 November 2025. The clause now exempts personal information of any person without the pre-amendment “larger public interest” proviso. The override has moved to Section 8(2).
• DPDP Rules 2025 — full amendment analysis — blog deep-dive by the Editor.
• PIO reply under Section 8(1)(j) after DPDP 2025 — a drafting guide with three speaking-order templates.

• Section 8(1)(a) — diplomatic correspondence, foreign confidential (CIC 2016, 2019)
• Section 8(1)(b) — court-directed non-disclosure line (CIC 2018)
• Section 8(1)(i) — R.K. Jain applied to State cabinets (CIC 2020)
• Section 8(1)(j) — post-DPDP guidance (Delhi HC 2025) — landmark
• Section 22 — overriding effect vs. Official Secrets Act (SC 2016) — landmark
• Section 7(3) — fee-intimation procedure (SC 2021) — landmark
• MGNREGS records — Odisha SIC 2020
• Land acquisition — Andhra SIC 2022
• Mining leases — Goa SIC 2021
• Smart City SPV records — CIC 2021
• Vaccination / Co-WIN data — CIC 2022
• Bar Council of India status — Delhi HC 2018

Each of these pillars now carries a Featured-Snippet-ready direct answer, FAQ schema, and HowTo schema where relevant:

• PIO RTI Reply Guide — the canonical reference for PIOs. Case-law cross-links inserted in April 2026.
• FAA Speaking-Order Guide — case-law cross-links inserted.
• Section 8(1)(j) Decision Framework — post-DPDP 2025.
• File RTI Online — 12 steps — 2026 edition.
• First Appeal Timelines.
• Grounds for RTI Rejection — decision tree.

• Outbound email — SPF + DKIM on own DNS (no external SMTP dependency). Password-reset, registration confirmation and weekly digest mail all accepted in Inbox by Gmail/Outlook from April 2026.
• Subscription stats — corrected to read DokuWiki's .mlist file format (previously assumed .subscribers).
• Profile photo upload — media path corrected to $conf['mediadir']; photo now renders after upload.
• Schema.org JSON-LD — Article + BreadcrumbList embedded on every case-detail page (coming).

• Discussion forum — Reddit-style aggregated view of every article's comments in one place.
• Weekly digest — opt in from your profile or on any article.
• Case-law search — filter by court and year to find the 2025-26 rulings that shape post-DPDP practice.
• Editorial blog — longer-form amendment analysis and commentary.

• RTI Wiki home
• Case-law database
• PIO / FAA CPD Course
• Full PIO / FAA knowledge base
• Report a correction

Last reviewed: 24 April 2026.