Whether information regarding misconduct of employees should be disclosed under right to information Act?

 In the present case, the respondent No. 2 and similarly like minded made various complaints to the petitioner herein and admittedly the number of cases initiated and the inquiry conducted against the various officers including the officer against whom the respondent No. 2 sought information for the reason to answer the public at large that on his complaint proper action has been taken by the petitioner against the corrupt officers. Since, the officer of the petitioner has already charge-sheeted, faced the Department Enquiry and finally punished, then what is the personal information with the petitioner and why the petitioner is not furnishing the details ask by the respondent No. 2 herein.

 In view of the above discussion, I am of the considered view that such information cannot be hold as a personal information and such information deserves to be given to expose the corrupt person in the public. 

IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI

W.P. (C) 11897/2016 and CM Appl. 46874/2016

Decided On: 15.11.2018

Food Corporation of India  Vs. Central Information Commissioner and Ors.

Hon'ble Judges/Coram:

Suresh Kait, J.

Citation: AIR 2019 Delhi 88

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Whether service details of employee can be disclosed under RTI?

 In our considered opinion, the issue involved herein remains no more res integra and stands settled by two decisions of this Court in Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. Central Information Commissioner and Ors., MANU/SC/0816/2012 : (2013) 1 SCC 212 and R.K. Jain v. Union of India and Anr., MANU/SC/0384/2013 : (2013) 14 SCC 794, it may not be necessary to re-examine any legal issue urged in this appeal.

13. In Girish Ramchandra Deshpande's case (supra), the Petitioner therein (Girish) had sought some personal information of one employee working in Sub Regional Office (provident fund) Akola. All the authorities, exercising their respective powers under the Act, declined the prayer for furnishing the information sought by the Petitioner. The High Court in writ petition filed by the Petitioner upheld the orders. Aggrieved by all the order, he filed special leave to appeal in this Court. Their Lordships dismissed the appeal and upholding the orders passed by the High Court held as under:

12. We are in agreement with the CIC and the courts below that the details called for by the Petitioner i.e. copies of all memos issued to the third Respondent, show-cause notices and orders of censure/punishment, etc. are qualified to be personal information as defined in Clause (j) of Section 8(1) of the RTI Act. The performance of an employee/officer in an organisation is primarily a matter between the employee and the employer and normally those aspects are governed by the service Rules which fall under the expression "personal information", the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or public interest. On the other hand, the disclosure of which would cause unwarranted invasion of privacy of that individual. Of course, in a given case, if the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information, appropriate orders could be passed but the Petitioner cannot claim those details as a matter of right.

13. The details disclosed by a person in his income tax returns are "personal information" which stand exempted from disclosure under Clause (j) of Section 8(1) of the RTI Act, unless involves a larger public interest and the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information.

14. In our considered opinion, the aforementioned principle of law applies to the facts of this case on all force. It is for the reasons that, firstly, the information sought by Respondent No. 1 of individual employees working in the Bank was personal in nature; secondly, it was exempted from being disclosed Under Section 8(j) of the Act and lastly, neither Respondent No. 1 disclosed any public interest much less larger public interest involved in seeking such information of the individual employee and nor any finding was recorded by the Central Information Commission and the High Court as to the involvement of any larger public interest in supplying such information to Respondent No. 1.

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

Civil Appeal No. 22 of 2009

Decided On: 31.08.2017

 Canara Bank Vs.  C.S. Shyam and Ors.

Hon'ble Judges/Coram:

R.K. Agrawal and Abhay Manohar Sapre, JJ.

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Whether details of counselling between estranged couple and counselor can be disclosed under RTI?

The   Commission   having   perused   the   file   found   that   the   file   is   a   proceeding   for  counselling, a prelude to or part of conciliation. The conciliation in general will include the  counselling also. The mediator or conciliator will advise or guide or apprise the parties of the  issues or steps that help resolving the dispute. When there is a counselling between a person  and counsellor, there emerges fiduciary relationship. Appellant has already filed a case for  domestic  violence.   Wife  claimed  that  proceeding  before  legal   service  authority   was  in  the  nature of divorce proceeding.  From the nature of proceedings it is apparently clear that it was  not divorce proceeding, but a counselling and conciliation proceeding, confidentiality of which  need to be protected as per the law and in public interest.  Information regarding negotiation,  mediation, conciliation and counselling will fall under exempted clause of information given in  fiduciary capacity and also private/personal information of other spouse and hence shall not be  disclosed. Hence the appeal is rejected.

Central Information Commission

Mrs rama Aggarwal vs Department Of Legal Affairs on 8 August, 2015
CENTRAL INFORMATION COMMISSION

                   


            Prof. M. Sridhar Acharyulu (Madabhushi Sridhar)

                                           Information Commissioner



                                           CIC/SA/A/2015/000305 

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Relative grading of officer's annual confidential reports during promotion held not to be personal information

The CIC has consistently held that the ACRs of an officer is in the nature of  personal   information   and   can   be   disclosed   only   to   him   and   to   none   else.  However, in the present case, the Appellant has not sought the copies of the  ACRs. She has only wanted to know the manner in which the DPC evaluated  and assessed the individual ACRs of the officers and arrived at the grading in  each case. The disclosure of the final relative grading will not help; without the  entire chart showing the complete assessment of every officer, it will not be  clear how the officers have been assessed in a related matrix. It is without  doubt that the relative grading of the ACRs is an important input in the final  

decision of the DPC in recommending some officers and not recommending  some   others.   As   held   by   us   in   several   similar   cases   in   the   past,   in   any  examination   or   evaluation   process,   certain   details   about   the   successful   or  recommended candidates must be disclosed in order to ensure transparency in  the selection process. Since the relative grading of the ACRs is the basis for  recommending a certain officer for promotion, this needs to be disclosed just as  the caste certificate of a public servant needs to be disclosed since that serves  as the basis for his appointment to the government service. Therefore, this no  longer remains personal information and should be disclosed as it forms the  very basis for the promotion of an individual officer.

Central Information Commission

Dr.Madhu Khare vs Union Public Service Commission on 5 October, 2012

Central Information Commission, New Delhi

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Person's income tax details can’t be revealed under RTI unless public interest overrides privacy concerns: SC

The income tax details of an employee cannot be revealed under RTI as a rule, but an exception could always be made in public interest, the Supreme Court has said.
The court said in a judgment delivered on October 3, 2012, that the income tax details of a person can't be revealed under RTI unless public interest overrides privacy concerns.

Such information is usually personal with no relationship to a person's public activity or public interest, it said. On the other hand, disclosure of such information may cause unwarranted invasion of an individual's privacy, the court said.

Performance of an employee is primarily a matter between him and the employer and is governed by service rules, which falls under "personal information", the court said.

 We are in agreement with the CIC and the courts below that the details called for by the petitioner i.e. copies of all memos issued to the third respondent, show cause notices and orders of censure/punishment etc. are qualified to be personal information as defined in clause (j) of Section 8(1) of the RTI Act. The performance of an employee/officer in an organization is primarily a matter between the employee and the employer and normally those aspects are governed by the service rules which fall under the expression "personal information", the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or public interest. On the other hand, the disclosure of which would cause unwarranted invasion of privacy of that individual. Of course, in a given case, if the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer of the Appellate Authority is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information, appropriate orders could be passed but the petitioner cannot claim those details as a matter of right.

14. The details disclosed by a person in his income tax returns are" personal information" which stand exempted from disclosure under clause(j) of Section 8(1) of the RTI Act, unless involves a larger public interest and the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the Appellate Authority is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information.

SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

Girish Ramchandra Deshpande Vs. Central Information Commissioner & Ors.

[Special Leave Petition (Civil) No. 27734 of 2012 (@ CC 14781/2012]

O R D E R

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What constitute personal information as per RTI ACT?

Section 8(1)(J) of the Right to Information Act, 2005 (Hereinafter called 'The Act') provides that notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen-

“Information which relates to personal information the disclosure of which has not relationship to any public activity or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual unless the Central Public Information officer or State Public Information officer or the appellate authority, as the case may be satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such Information”: Provided that the Information, which cannot be denied to the parliament or a state legislature shall not be denied to any person.

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Salary details of employees - Not personal information under RTI Act

An application seeking information under RTI Act regarding the annual gross income details of the Deputy Manager was made to PIO of TNPL. It was declined on the ground that it is of personal nature and that it would not be revealed to a third person without the authorisation of the employee concerned. On appeal, State Information Commission held that the information must be given immediately. The Deputy Manager, aggrieved filed writ petition to quash the order of Commission contending that the information relates to personal information and the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or interest and it would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of a person. High Court observed that under Section 4 (x) of RTI Act public authority is obliged to maintain all its records and has to publish the monthly remuneration received by each of its officers and employees, including the system of compensation. Further under Sub-section 2 the public authority should provide this information suo motu through various means of communications. High Court therefore, held that public authority was under a statutory obligation to make available the information relating to the monthly remuneration received by each of the officers and employees. In fact, it is not necessary for any person to seek this information if TNPL had discharged its obligation under Section 4.

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