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Civil Appeal No. 9052 of 2012 (Arising out of SLP (C) No. 20217 of 2011). Case: Bihar Public Service Commission Vs Saiyed Hussain Abbas Rizwi and Anr.. Supreme Court (India)

Judgment Cited authorities 1 Cited in 4 Precedent Map Related
Vincent
Case NumberCivil Appeal No. 9052 of 2012 (Arising out of SLP (C) No. 20217 of 2011)
CounselFor Appellant: Navin Prakash, Adv. and For Respondents: Mamta Tiwari and Pranav Vyas, Advs. for Fox Mandal and Co., Anjan Chakraborty and Shekhar Kumar, Advs.
JudgesSwatanter Kumar and Sudhansu Jyoti Mukhopadhaya, JJ.
IssueRight to Information Act, 2005 - Sections 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 8(1), 10, 11, 24; Constitution of India - Articles 21, 315
Citation2013 (I) AD 364 (SC), 2013 (1) AllMR 444 (SC), 2013 (1) MLJ 747 (SC), RLW 2013 (1) SC 550, 2012 (12) SCALE 525
Judgement DateDecember 13, 2012
CourtSupreme Court (India)

Judgment:

Swatanter Kumar, J.

1. Leave granted.

2. The Bihar Public Service Commission (for short, 'the Commission) published advertisement No. 6 of 2000 dated 10th May, 2000 in the local papers of the State of Bihar declaring its intention to fill up the posts of 'State Examiner of Questioned Documents', in Police Laboratory in Crime Investigation Department, Government of Bihar, Patna. The advertisement, inter alia, stated that written examination would be held if adequate number of applications were received. As very limited number of applications were received, the Commission, in terms of the advertisement, decided against the holding of written examination. It exercised the option to select the candidates for appointment to the said post on the basis of viva voce test alone. The Commission completed the process of selection and recommended the panel of selected candidates to the State of Bihar.

3. One Saiyed Hussain Abbas Rizwi, Respondent No. 1 herein, claiming to be a public spirited citizen, filed an application before the Commission (Appellant herein) under the Right to Information Act, 2005 (for short "the Act") on 16th December, 2008 seeking information in relation to eight queries. These queries concerned the interview which was held on 30th September, 2002 and 1st October, 2002 by the Commission with regard to the above advertisement. These queries, inter alia, related to providing the names, designation and addresses of the subject experts present in the Interview Board, names and addresses of the candidates who appeared, the interview statement with certified photocopies of the marks of all the candidates, criteria for selection of the candidates, tabulated statement containing average marks allotted to the candidates from matriculation to M. Sc. during the selection process with the signatures of the members/officers and certified copy of the merit list. This application remained pending with the Public Information Officer of the Commission for a considerable time that led to filing of an appeal by Respondent No. 1 before the State Information Commission. When the appeal came up for hearing, the State Information Commission vide its order dated 30th April, 2009 had directed the Public Information Officer-cum-Officer on Special Duty of the Commission that the information sought for be made available and the case was fixed for 27th August, 2009 when the following order was passed:

The applicant is present. A letter dated 12.08.2009 of the Public Information Officer, Bihar Public Service Commission, Patna has been received whereby the required paragraph-wise information which could be supplied, has been given to the applicant. Since the information which could be supplied has been given to the applicant, the proceedings of the case are closed.

4. At this stage, we may also notice that the Commission, vide its letter dated 12th August, 2009, had furnished the information nearly to all the queries of Respondent No. 1. It also stated that no written test had been conducted and that the name, designation and addresses of the members of the Interview Board could not be furnished as they were not required to be supplied in accordance with the provisions of Section 8(1)(g) of the Act.

5. Aggrieved from the said order of the Information Commission dated 27th August, 2009, Respondent No. 1 challenged the same by filing a writ before the High Court of Judicature at Patna. The matter came up for hearing before a learned Judge of that Court, who, vide judgment dated 27th November, 2009 made the following observations and dismissed the writ petition:

If information with regard to them is disclosed, the secrecy and the authenticity of the process itself may be jeopardized apart from that information would be an unwarranted invasion into privacy of the individual. Restricting giving this information has a larger public purpose behind it. It is to maintain purity of the process of selection. Thus, in view of specific provision in Section 8(1)(j), in my view, the information could not be demanded as matter of right. The designated authority in that organization also did not consider it right to divulge the information in larger public interest, as provided in the said provision.

6. Feeling aggrieved, Respondent No. 1 challenged the judgment of the learned Single Judge before the Division Bench of that Court by filing a letters patent appeal being LPA No. 102 of 2010. The Division Bench, amongst others, noticed the following contentions:

(i) that third party interest was involved in providing the information asked for and, therefore, could properly be denied in terms of Section 2(n) read with Sections 8(1)(j) and 11 of the Act.

(ii) that Respondent No. 1 (the applicant) was a mere busybody and not a candidate himself and was attempting to meddle with the affairs of the Commission needlessly.

7. The Division Bench took the view that the provisions of Section 8(1)(j) were not attracted in the facts of the case in hand inasmuch as this provision had application in respect of law enforcement agency and for security purposes. Since no such consideration arose with respect to the affairs of the Commission and its function was in public domain, reliance on the said provision for denying the information sought for was not tenable in law. Thus, the Court in its order dated 20th January, 2011 accepted the appeal, set aside the order of the learned Single Judge and directed the Commission to communicate the information sought for to Respondent No. 1. The Court directed the Commission to provide the names of the members of the Interview Board, while denying the disclosure of and providing photocopies of the papers containing the signatures and addresses of the members of the Interview Board.

8. The Commission challenging the legality and correctness of the said judgment has filed the present appeal by way of special leave.

9. The question that arises for consideration in the present case is as to whether the Commission was duty bound to disclose the names of the members of the Interview Board to any person including the examinee. Further, when the Commission could take up the plea of exemption from disclosure of information as contemplated Under Section 8 of the Act in this regard.

10. Firstly, we must examine the purpose and scheme of this Act. For this purpose, suffice would it be to refer to the judgment of this Court in the case of Namit Sharma v. Union of India [2012 (8) SCALE 593], wherein this Court has held as under:

27. In terms of the Statement of Objects and Reasons of the Act of 2002, it was stated that this law was enacted in order to make the government more transparent and accountable to the public. It was felt that in the present democratic framework, free flow of information for citizens and non-Government institutions suffers from several bottlenecks including the existing legal framework, lack of infrastructure at the grass root level and an attitude of secrecy within the Civil Services as a result of the old framework of rules. The Act was to deal with all such aspects. The purpose and object was to make the government more transparent and accountable to the public and to provide freedom to every citizen to secure access to information under the control of public authorities, consistent with public interest, in order to promote openness, transparency and accountability in administration and in relation to matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.

11. The scheme of the Act contemplates for setting out the practical regime of right to information for citizens to secure access to information under the control of public authorities, in order to promote transparency and accountability...

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