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 provisio