HC inquiries not a private affair, open to RTI scrutiny: CIC

The findings of internal inquiries of High Court are not a "private affair" and can be sought under the RTI Act, the Central Information Commission has ruled. Judges are public persons and hold public posts so they cannot be said to be within the purview of a private employer-employee relationship, held the Commission. It rejected the argument of Delhi High Court that inquiry and investigations against an officer is an internal matter between employer and employee and disclosure thereof is not in public domain. Social worker Pratap Singh Gandas has sought details of a vigilance inquiry ordered by Registrar Vigilance of Delhi High Court, on his complaint, against three metropolitan Magistrate. His request was denied by the High Court saying that the application cannot be said to involve an information which can be in "public domain" within the meaning of expression under its RTI rules. His appeal was also rejected by the High Court saying that "inquiry and investigations against an officer is an internal matter between the employer and employee and disclosure thereof is not in public domain." The CIC said that an investigation ordered by an institution as august as the High Court cannot be construed as private activity. "We cannot agree that disclosing the results of an investigation in which the name of the party investigated is cleared will tarnish the name of that party when such an action is compared to any effort to keep such information exempt from disclosure which can only lead to the rise of the unwarranted suspicion and mistrust implying concealment," said CIC while ordering the High Court to provide the necessary information to Gandas. The Commission, however, agreed that some information which could constitute breach of any confidentiality that may have been part of the understanding of investigators and witnesses in conducting the investigations. "It will be open to CPIO therefore to sever such part of the information sought that is considered otherwise exempt by exercising severability under...RTI Act," said the CIC.

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