Judgment :-

A.K. Patnaik, J.

These are petitions filed under Article 137 of the Constitution of India for review of the judgment dated 13.09.2012 of this Court in Writ Petition (C) No.210 of 2012 (hereinafter referred to as ‘the judgment under review’).

Background Facts:

2. In Writ Petition (C) No.210 of 2012 filed under Article 32 of the Constitution of India, Namit Sharma, the respondent herein, had prayed for declaring the provisions of Sections 12(5), 12(6), 15(5) and 15(6) of the Right to Information Act, 2005 (for short ‘the Act’) as ultra vires the Constitution. Sections 12(5), 12(6), 15(5) and 15(6) of the Act are extracted hereinbelow:

“12(5) The Chief Information Commissioner and Information Commissioners shall be persons of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance.”

“12(6) The Chief Information Commissioner or an Information Commissioner shall not be a Member of Parliament or Member of the Legislature of any State or Union Territory, as the case may be, or hold any other office of profit or connected with any political party or carrying on any business or pursuing any profession.”

“15(5) The State Chief Information Commissioner and State Information Commissioners shall be persons of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance.”

“15(6) The State Chief Information Commissioner or a State Information Commissioner shall not be a Member of Parliament or Member of the Legislature of any State or Union Territory, as the case may be, or hold any other office of profit or connected with any political party or carrying on any business or pursuing any profession.”

The grounds taken in the writ petition were that the provisions of Sections 12(5), 12(6), 15(5) and 15(6) of the Act laying down the eligibility criteria for appointment of Central Information Commissioners and State Information Commissioners were vague and had no nexus with the object of the Act and were violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India and while enacting these provisions, Parliament had not exercised legislative power in consonance with the constitutional principles and guarantees.

3. After hearing the learned counsel for the respondent-writ petitioner and the learned Additional Solicitor General for Union of India, this Court held in the judgment under review that the provisions of Sections 12(5) and 15(5) of the Act did not specify the basic qualifications of the persons to be appointed as Information Commissioners and only mentioned that the Chief Information Commissioner and Information Commissioners shall be persons of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance. This Court held that the knowledge and experience in the different fields mentioned in Section 12(5) and Section 15(5) of the Act would presuppose a graduate who possesses basic qualification in the concerned field. This Court also held that Sections 12(6) and 15(6) of the Act, which provide that the Chief Information Commissioner or an Information Commissioner shall not be a Member of Parliament or Member of the Legislature of any State or Union Territory or hold any other office of profit or be connected with any political party or carry on any business or pursue any profession, do not disqualify such persons for consideration for appointment as Chief Information Commissioner or Information Commissioner, but these disqualifications will come into play after a person is appointed as Chief Election Commissioner or Information Commissioner. In other words, after a Chief Election Commissioner or Information Commissioner is appointed, he cannot continue to be a Member of Parliament or Member of the Legisla