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Transparency or Secrecy? CIC Questions the Halt on Paper-wise Mark Disclosure for CSE Candidates
In a significant move that highlights the ongoing tension between and the public's right to know, the (CIC) has stepped in to question why the (UPSC) and the (DoPT) discontinued the practice of publishing the paper-wise bifurcation of marks for successful Civil Services Examination (CSE) candidates.
The case, born from a filed by aspirant Aniket Kumar Gupta, challenges the current trend of releasing only aggregate final marks—a practice that applicants argue has created an in one of India’s most competitive assessments.
The Disappearing Data: A Decade of Opacity Until , the UPSC routinely published a breakdown of marks obtained by recommended candidates across General Studies, optional subjects, and the personality test. However, from onward, this transparency was curtailed. Candidates like Gupta argue that this shift has left aspirants in the dark, particularly regarding which optional subjects yield higher scores, effectively forcing them to rely on speculative and often predatory claims made by private coaching institutes.
"The lack of official subject-wise disclosure fuels a ‘market-accepted’ narrative, where aspirants are lured into choosing subjects based on coaching propaganda rather than verified performance trends,"
the appellant argued during the hearing.
Contradictory Stances: A Conflict of Claims
A major sticking point for Information Commissioner Anandi Ramalingam was the lack of consistency between the two authorities involved. Interestingly, while the DoPT claimed that subject-wise marks were
"prepared, maintained and retained solely by UPSC,"
the UPSC’s own representative stated during the proceedings that this data was indeed shared with the DoPT.
The CIC noted that this "contradictory stance" suggested a lack of a clear, unified policy regarding the publication of results. Furthermore, the Commission found it problematic that neither body could produce a specific circular, file noting, or policy document justifying the decision to stop publicizing bifurcated marks. The justification offered—that such information is "personal"—was dismissed as inconsistent, given that the names and aggregate marks of these very candidates are already public record.
The Coaching Conundrum and The DoPT maintained that releasing detailed subject-wise marks could lead to the misuse of data by coaching centers, which might cherry-pick scores to manipulate student choices. However, the appellant countered that this logic is flawed because the absence of official data actually empowers coaching centers to create false, unverifiable success narratives. By treating performance data as “private,” the respondents were, in the petitioner’s view, inadvertently protecting the interests of private institutions over the needs of government aspirants.
The CIC’s Ultimatum In a stern observation, Commissioner Ramalingam emphasized that the respondents failed to address why the criteria for privacy shifted so abruptly after . As the CIC noted:
"The did not produce any corroborative record, circular, policy or file noting in support of the decision to discontinue the averred practice and solely premised his contentions based on ."
The Commission has now granted the DoPT a final six-week window to provide a "comprehensive, categorical, and self-explanatory" justification for the policy change. The DoPT must account for why such a breakdown should not be reinstated in the interest of transparency.
This case follows a broader trend where questions regarding the UPSC's procedural transparency are reaching the highest tiers of oversight, including recent discussions in the
regarding the publication of answer keys. For now, the millions of aspirants preparing for the
"highest echelons of the bureaucracy"
are left waiting to see if the doors to data transparency will be reopened.
Key Observations
*
On Policy Justification:
"The
did not produce any corroborative record, circular, policy or file noting in support of the decision to discontinue the averred practice and solely premised his contentions based on
."
*
On Contradiction:
"In view of the foregoing observations, especially with regard to contradictory stances taken by UPSC & DoPT, and considering that the basis for discontinuation of the practice has not been satisfactorily clarified..."
*
On Transparency:
"The appellant’s arguments concerning the
’s selective application of the ground that the information in respect of bifurcated marks is of ‘
’ remains unaddressed by the
, particularly when aggregate marks [and] names... have already been published."
