Back
Rules SEBI Not Obliged to Gather Third-Party Information for RTI Applicants
A Division Bench of the has ruled that the is not required under the (RTI Act) to collect information from a private body such as the merely because an applicant seeks that information under the RTI framework. The judgment, delivered on , quashed a series of orders passed by the that had directed SEBI to obtain data from BSE and furnish it to RTI applicants.
The Dispute: CIC's Overreach?
The litigation arose from orders passed by the CIC in response to RTI applications filed by individuals seeking information that was not in SEBI's possession but was held by BSE. The CIC, interpreting Section 2(f) of the RTI Act, concluded that SEBI—as a public authority and regulator—was obliged not only to provide information already in its records but also to actively collect information from third parties like BSE to satisfy citizen queries.
SEBI and BSE challenged these directions before the . They argued that the RTI Act requires a public authority to provide only the information it holds or controls at the time of the request, subject to statutory exemptions, and does not impose an obligation to gather information from third parties.
Legal Foundation: Supreme Court Precedents
The High Court examined the scope of "information" under Section 2(f) of the RTI Act, along with Sections 2(j), 8, and 11. It noted that while the definition of information is broad, it does not compel a public authority to create, collect, or compile information it does not already possess.
The court relied heavily on two key Supreme Court rulings. In
v. Aditya Bandopadhyay
(2011), the Supreme Court had clarified:
"The RTI Act provides
... But where the information sought is not a part of the record of a public authority, and where such information is not required to be maintained under any law or the rules or regulations of the public authority, the Act does not cast an obligation upon the public authority, to
and then furnish it to an applicant."
This principle was subsequently approved by a Constitution Bench in
Central Public Information Officer, v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal
(2020). The Constitution Bench held that the expression
"
"
in Section 2(j) of the RTI Act is restrictive and reflects the limits of the right to information.
A Direct Application of Law
Applying these precedents, the
found that the CIC's reasoning was
"
clarified by the Supreme Court."
The court observed that SEBI, as a regulator, has the power to call for information from BSE under its own governing statute, but that power does not translate into an obligation under the RTI Act to collect and furnish that information to applicants.
The court also noted that even the CIC, in subsequent orders following the Supreme Court's clarification, had held that SEBI is not required to obtain information from third parties for RTI applicants.
Key Observations
The judgment quotes extensively from the
Aditya Bandopadhyay
case, emphasizing that
"a public authority is also not required to furnish information which require
."
The High Court further stressed that the RTI Act
"does not cast an obligation upon a public authority, like SEBI in the present case, to collect or collate information not available with it and then to furnish the same to the applicants."
Decision and Implications
The allowed all nine writ petitions filed by SEBI and BSE, quashing and setting aside the CIC orders that had directed SEBI to obtain information from third parties. The court concluded that those directions could not stand in light of the settled legal position.
The ruling reinforces a clear boundary: under the RTI Act, public authorities are gatekeepers of information they already hold, not investigators tasked with gathering data from private entities. For regulators like SEBI, this means they can respond to RTI requests based on their existing records without being compelled to activate their statutory powers of information collection solely for the benefit of an RTI applicant.
The decision is expected to bring clarity to RTI jurisprudence, particularly in cases involving regulatory bodies that have access to third-party data under different statutory frameworks.
