2019 Supreme(Bom) 586

IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT GOA
Nutan D. Sardessai, J.
Deepak Pandharinath Vaingankar – Appellant
Vs.
Suryakant Babu Naik – Respondent
Writ Petition No. 797 of 2018
Decided On : 12-04-2019

Headnote:

Right to Information Act, 2005 – Sections 2(j),2(h),8(1),8(1)(j) – Constitution of India,1950 - Article 227 – challenge – Application - application was moved by the respondent No.1 under Section 6(1) of the Act, seeking the personal particulars of the petitioner, vis-a-vis his date of appointment, working hours, educational qualifications, details of higher education, so on and so forth in that connection. The petitioner had filed a reply to the respondent No.2 whereby he had raised serious objection to the furnishing of this information to the respondent No.1, and otherwise spelt out that the application was motivated at the instance of the respondent No.1 only to harass him and to settle personal scores. The Public Information Officer had passed the order on 11.10.2017 whereby he had declined the information as claimed by the respondent No.1. The respondent No.1 had preferred an appeal and the Appellate Authority, i.e. the respondent No.3, had by its Order dated 04.01.2018 dismissed his appeal after considering the citations relied upon on behalf of the petitioner, and considering his case. The respondent No.1 did not rest easy thereafter but had instead preferred a second appeal before the respondent No.4 who had passed the order which was assailed in the present petition. He adverted to the provisions of Sections 6, 8, 11 and 19 of the said Act, placed reliance in Versus Public Information Officer and 3 Others, [Writ Petition No. 1 of 2009], to substantiate his contention. It was his further contention that no public interest was disclosed by the respondent No.1 in pursuing the application under the Act, and therefore this was a fit case to quash the order under challenge – Held, Principle of law applies to the facts of the case at large on all fours. The information sought by the respondent No.1 of individual employees working in the Bank was personal in nature, secondly it was exempted from being disclosed under Section 8(1)(j) of the Act, and lastly, the respondent No.1 neither disclosed any public interest, much less larger public interest, involved in seeking such information of the individual employee, nor was any finding recorded by the Central Information Commission and the High Court as to the involvement of any larger public interest in supplying such information to the respondent No.1. In that view of the matter, the Apex Court held that the application made by the respondent No.1 under Section 6 of the Act, was wholly misconceived and had been rightly rejected by the Public Information Officer and the Chief Public Information Officer, whereas it was wrongly allowed by the Central Information Commission and the High Court in allowing the appeal set aside the orders of the High Court and the Central Information Commission, restoring those passed by the Public Information Officer and the Chief Public Information Officer - details called for by the petitioner, i.e. the copies of all the 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 Act. The petitioner in the instant case had not made out a bonafide public interest in seeking the information; the disclosure of such information would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual under Section 8(1)(j) of the Act and in that view of the matter, dismissed the special leave petition. The respondent No.1 had not showed from the tenor of his application, what was the larger interest which was involved to seek the personal information of the petitioner, which he did before the Public Information Officer, and who rightly dismissed his application, and so too the first appellate authority dismissed the appeal, although the respondent No.4 in his wisdom allowed the appeal at the instance of the respondent No.1 and directed the furnishing of his personal information, although no such case had been made out of larger public interest - Writ Petition allowed