The duty of the Government to ensure administrative efficiency through transparency and access to assets details of its officers overrides the exemption under Section 8(1)(j) of the Right to Information Act, 2005.

D. Murugesan, J.

1. The writ appeal is directed against the order dated 2.2.2010 dismissing the writ petition filed by the appellant. The facts leading to the present writ appeal are as follows. The appellant made an application dated 12.2.2009 to the Public Information Officer, Public Department, Government of Tamil Nadu seeking permission to inspect the five latest statement of assets disclosure submitted by the ten I.A.S. Officers including the Chief Secretary to Government of Tamil Nadu and the nine Secretaries of the Departments of Finance, Industries, Health and Family Welfare, Agriculture, Public Works Department, Housing and Urban Development, Home, Prohibition and Excise, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj and Revenue. That application was rejected by the Public Information Officer in his letter dated 16.3.2009 on the ground that the information sought was exempt under Section 8(1)(j) of the Right to Information Act, 2005. Being aggrieved by the said communication, the appellant preferred an appeal to the appellate authority and the same was also rejected on 22.4.2009 with the same reason. Thereafter, the appellant filed a further appeal to the State Information Commission. The State Information Commission held that Section 8(1)(j) is not applicable for the assets details of Government servants. Nevertheless, it found that the information presented in a sealed cover constitutes information that is "held" by the public authority to ensure confidentiality and the assets details of public servants are personal information and since there was no public interest cause established, the information need not be disclosed. The said order was unsuccessfully challenged by the appellant in the writ petition giving rise to the present writ appeal.

2. We have heard Dr.V.Krishna Ananth, learned counsel for the petitioner, Mr.Vivek Sriram, learned counsel for the first respondent and Mr.M.C.Swamy, learned Special Government Pleader for the second respondent.

3. Before we consider the issue raised in this writ appeal, we may refer to our own judgment in The Superintendent of Police, Central Range, Office of the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption v. R.Karthikeyan and others, 2011 (3) CTC 241, where we have narrated the history and object of the legislation, namely, the Right to Information Act, 2005 and the judgments of the Supreme Court. The relevant paragraphs 7 to 14 of the said judgment read thus:

"7...... The legal entrenchment of the right to information is drawn from the United Nations, which recognised the "freedom of Information as fundamental human right and as the touchstone for all freedoms to which the United Nations was consecrated." The right of free expression and declaring information has been recognised at the common law many years back, as the fundamental rights of the public to know what the Government have been transacting in their name. Until we adopted our Constitution in 1950, there had been no scope for individual freedom at any time in India's history. After the Constitution, the liberty of thought is the basis of freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a), which is an essential component of a democratic governance. The right to information is now treated as an invisible integral part of the right of free speech. As information is vital not only for the betterment of the society but also for the betterment of an individual, Article 21 guarantees right to life including the basic right to be informed.

8. India has adopted a democratic form of Government and no democratic Government can survive without accountability and the basic postulate of accountability is that the people should have information about the functioning of the Government. It is only when the people know how the Government is functioning, they can fulfill the role which democracy assigned to them and make democracy a really effective participatory democracy. Right to information is basic to any democracy. A vibrant