O R D E R

1. The appellant filed an application under the Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI Act) before the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO), M/o. Finance, Central Board of Excise Customs (CBEC), New Delhi seeking following information:-

“(A). Please refer your letter F. No. C-11015/76/2018- Ad.V/12091 dated 26.11.2018 sent to me. You have written that you had received from the CBI "full facts and evidence".

(B). Please send me copy of each paper received from CBI on the basis of which sanction order was issued by the Excise Deptt. to Prosecute Sri Babua Tuddu, the then Superintendent of Central Excise vide Sanction Order F.No. C-14011/23/2003-Ad.V/2092-

97 dated 12.07.2004.

(C) Kindly let me know full address with phone and fax No. of the 1st Appellate Authority.”

2. The CPIO responded on 02-01-2019. The appellant filed the first appeal dated 12-02-2019 which was disposed of by the first appellate authority on 22- 04-2019. Thereafter, he filed a second appeal u/Section 19(3) of the RTI Act before the Commission requesting to take appropriate legal action against the CPIO u/Section 20 of the RTI Act, 2005 and also to direct him to provide the sought for information.

Hearing:

3. The appellant, Mr. Ratan Mishra attended the hearing through audio conferencing. Mr. Sanjay Dalmia, CPIO participated in the hearing representing the respondent through audio conferencing. The written submissions are taken on record.

4. The appellant contended that the action taken against an employee of the public authority cannot be treated as an exempted information and therefore, the exemption claimed by the CPIO u/Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act, 2005 is not appropriate.

5. The respondent contended that the performance of an employee in an organization is a matter between the employer and employee covered by the ratio of the judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India in Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. Central Information Commissioner &Ors., (2013) 1 SCC 212. Therefore, they have claimed exemption u/Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act, 2005 for denying the documents received from the CBI on the basis of which sanction order was issued by the Excise Department to prosecute Sri Babua Tuddu.

Decision:

6. This Commission observes that the details of the disciplinary proceedings initiated against the employee of the public authority cannot be provided to the appellant, as it is a matter between employer and employees covered by the ratio of the judgment of Hon’ble Supreme Court of India in Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. Central Information Commissioner &Ors., (2013) 1 SCC 212, wherein, it was observed as under:-

“13. We are in agreement with the CIC and the courts below that the details called for by the petitioner i.e. copies of all 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 RTI Act. The performance of an employee/officer in an organization is primarily a matter between the employee and the employer and normally those aspects are governed by the service rules which fall under the expression “personal information”, the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or public interest.”

7. In view of the foregoing, this Commission comes to the conclusion that the documents received from the CBI on the basis of which sanction order was issued by the Excise Department to prosecute Sri Babua Tuddu cannot be disclosed to the appellant in the absence of any larger public interest in the matter. Accordingly, this Commission upholds the exemption claimed by the CPIO u/Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act, 2005.

8. With the above observations, the appeal is disposed of.

9. Copy of the decision be provided free of cost to the parties.

Neeraj Kumar Gupta ( )

नीरज कुमार गु(cid:3)ा

Information Commissioner ( )

सूचना आयु(cid:7)

/ Date : 10-03-2021 (cid:11)दनांक Authenticated true copy ( )

अिभ(cid:23)मािणत स(cid:28)यािपत (cid:23)ित