Judicial Independence & Right to Information

 ABSTRACT

Right to information has been declared as a fundamental right under Article 19 (1)(a) while an independent and strong judiciary is the basic feature of the Indian Constitutional structure. The Constitutional morality which includes the upholding of fundamental rights of the people acknowledges the mechanism of check and balance. Constitutional morality therefore on one hand disallows excessive powers in hands of any authority, while on the other hand allows for an independent and free judiciary which really upholds the rights of the society at large. The balance between the two is the focus of the assignment.

 

 

Knowledge is power. It empowers the possessor. Information is the basis of knowledge. It is not wrong to say that information is directly related to empowerment. In a democracy, the empowerment of people is essential for its successful governance. The Right to Information gained momentum after it was recognised by International discernments such as UDHR1948 and ICCPR 1966 and European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. 

While highlighting the importance of information Justice Nageshwar Rao¹ spoke thus:

“Free flow of information and free flow of thought and expression is very important for stability of society and for change in the social order because with changing times, the social order has to change.”

 

The right to information is not expressly mentioned in Fundamental rights chapter but is a result of judicial interpretation of Article 19 (1)(a). Through several cases which arose in past and recently the concept and importance of right to information has been highlighted. The question arises as to whether the judiciary is within the purview of the RTI?

Judiciary, as we all are aware, is one of the three organs of the state, the other two being the Legislature and the Executive. Legislature and Executive have always been under the ambit of the RTI act but, its relation with Judiciary has not been the same mainly due to the reason that the independence of Judiciary has been enshrined in the basic structure doctrine. Therefore, it had always been feared that subjecting this independent organ of the government to RTI could take away its freedom. 

But, eventually, in 2019, the Supreme Court held that the Office of the Chief Justice of India comes under the ambit of the RTI.²

The Right to Information Act came in the year 2005. Under this Act, every public body is to be included in the RTI. And for a particular body to get an exemption from RTI obligations, it needs to be listed under Section 24 of the statute.³Judiciary, though, does not find its mention under this section; therefore, it becomes clear that the provisions of the RTI should bound judiciary.⁴

But, that has not happened in the last decade for, the Judiciary has remained reluctant in getting bound by the relevant rules in turn, getting itself a kind of immunity from the Act. On the other hand, attempts to make Judiciary more accountable and responsive to the information sought by the citizens started in 2007 itself.

 

1.     Chief Justice of India is amenable to the Right to Information Act.

 

The Sequence of Events

Backdrop:

On November 11, 2007, RTI Activist Mr. Subhash Chandra Agarwal, "led a plea in the Supreme Court of India requesting information on the assets of judges. But the same was refused to be revealed by the court. 

In response, the first appeal stood "led at the Supreme Court's registry and this request too got denied. 

Mr. Agarwal, then, moved to the Central Information Commission which thereafter, in 2009, asked the SC to disclose information of judges' assets, for the office of the Chief Justice of India, came under RTI. The Supreme Court, on receiving this order, went to the Delhi High Court challenging its validity which led to a temporary stay of the CIC order.⁵

Arguments given by SC: 

Supreme Court: Asset declaration by the Judges would come under ‘Personal Information' so that was not liable to be declared under the RTI Act as there are necessary provisions in the act which exempts one from disclosing personal information. 

Read:

Section 8 (1) (j) reads thus:

“Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen information which relates to personal information the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual unless the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority, as the case may be, is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information: 

Provided that the information which cannot be denied to the Parliament or a State Legislature shall not be denied to any person.” 

They further reckoned that Judges could not be treated the same way as the politicians when it came to asset declaration. Also, it was argued that bringing Judiciary under RTI and allowing too much of transparency could eventually take away the independent nature of the Judicial Organ. 

 

Verdict of the HC: 

On September 2, 2009, single-judge bench of the High Court of Delhi held that CJI's Office is accountable under the RTI Act and thus, the assets need to be declared under the law. 

This judgement got challenged by the Supreme Court before the division bench of the Delhi HC in response to which a 3-judge bench was constituted. 

Thereafter, this special bench observed that the declaration of assets by the judges to the CJI was binding on them. Finally, on January 12, 2010, the ruling was delivered stating that the Office of CJI was under the ambit of the RTI Act.⁶

 

Onset of the 2019 SC Judgement: 

In 2010 itself, after the Delhi HC judgement, Secretary-General of the Supreme Court along with Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) went on to file appeals against the Central Information Commission and High Court orders. The matter, later on, was referred to the Constitutional Bench by the Supreme Court. 

 

On November 13, 2019, the Supreme Court's 5-judge constitution Bench of Ranjan Gogoi, CJ and NV Ramana, Dr. DY Chandrachud, Deepak Gupta and Sanjiv Khanna final verdict came upholding the Delhi HC judgement thereby stating that the Office of the Chief Justice of India comes under the definition of ‘Public Authority' and hence, it is bound by the Right to Information Act.⁷

 

Importance of the Supreme Court Judgement 

This landmark judgement given in Central Public Information Officer; Supreme Court of India v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal⁸ is crucial to understand for it ended the constant debate that revolved around the inclusion of Judiciary under the ambit of RTI. 

✔ The court pronounced that the need to have transparency did not undermine judicial independence and stated that independence and accountability go hand in hand in the case of Judiciary. 

 

✔ Decision to go for public disclosure must be taken on a case by case basis taking into consideration the competing public interest claims and weighing them along with the privacy concerns. 

✔ On the question of whether the Supreme Court and the Office of the CJI were two separate public authorities under RTI, the court observed that the Supreme Court of India i.e. a public authority, in view of Article 124⁹ of the Constitution, necessarily includes the office of the CJI as well other judges.¹⁰ 

✔Offices together constitute the Supreme Court and are therefore, part and parcel of the Supreme Court (as a body, authority and institution). 

 

✔With regards to the fiduciary relationship, the Supreme Court rejected the existence of such a connection between the judges and the CJI.¹¹ 

The appellants, in view of section 8(e)¹² of the RTI Act (that provides an exemption from disclosure of information held under fiduciary relationship by a person) had contended that the information on judges' assets held by the CJI was in a fiduciary relationship. The Court, while declining such claims, observed that such a relationship could arise in certain situations only. 

 

 

2.    Supreme Court Refuses To Disclose Justice Patnaik's Probe Report On 'Larger Conspiracy' Against Judiciary Under RTI 

The Public Information Officer of the Supreme Court has recently refused to disclose the details of a report submitted by former SC Judge, Justice AK Patnaik, on the probe into the "larger conspiracy" behind the sexual harassment allegations levelled against the then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi.

In response to an RTI application filed by journalist Saurav Das seeking details of the report, the CPIO of Supreme Court said,

"the nature of information sought is exempt under Section 8(1)(b), 8(1)(j) and Section 11(1) of the Right to Information Act, 2005."

READ:

8. (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen,—

(b) information which has been expressly forbidden to be published by any court of law or tribunal or the disclosure of which may constitute contempt of court; 

(j) information which relates to personal information the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual unless the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority, as the case may be, is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information:

Provided that the information which cannot be denied to the Parliament or a State Legislature shall not be denied to any person.

11. (1) Where a Central Public Information Officer or a State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, intends to disclose any information or record, or part thereof on a request made under this Act, which relates to or has been supplied by a third party and has been treated as confidential by that third party, the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, shall, within five days from the receipt of the request, give a written notice to such third party of the request and of the fact that the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, intends to disclose the information or record, or part thereof, and invite the third party to make a submission in writing or orally, regarding whether the information should be disclosed, and such submission of the third party shall be kept in view while taking a decision about disclosure of information:

Provided that except in the case of trade or commercial secrets protected by law, disclosure may be allowed if the public interest in disclosure outweighs in importance any possible harm or injury to the interests of such third party.

 

Background

In 2019, in response to some media reports on sexual harassment allegations against the then CJI Ranjan Gogoi made by a former Supreme Court employee, the SC initiated a suo moto case titled "In Re : Matter Of Great Public Importance Touching Upon The Independence Of Judiciary-Mentioned By Shri Tushar Mehta, Solicitor General of India"

The former CJI Gogoi had claimed that there was a bigger plot behind the allegations and, that the people who had instituted the same wanted to "deactivate the office of CJI" and therefore, the independence of the judiciary was under very serious threat.

On April 23, 2019 a suo moto case, a Bench of Justices Arun Misra, RF Nariman and Deepak Gupta ordered that the former Supreme Court Judge, Justice AK Patnaik (April 25, 2019), would hold an inquiry regarding the alleged conspiracy by fixers and disgruntled employees against the former CJI.

Recently, the Supreme Court closed the suo moto proceedings by observing, "two years having passed and the possibility of recovery of electronic records at this distance of time is remote, especially since the scope of the enquiry and the power of the learned Judge is limited, no useful purpose will be served by continuing these proceedings."

The closure order passed by Justice Kaul-led bench further observed that the report of Justice Patnaik - which has not been made available in public domain - acknowledged that the "existence of a conspiracy cannot be completely ruled out.”

 

RTI Application sought disclosure of probe report

Sourav Das had moved an application under the RTI Act seeking copy of the entire enquiry report of Justice Patnaik.

He contended that after the enactment of the RTI Act, no public authority can escape disclosure of information by deciding to keep records in sealed cover. 

"Since the RTI Act does not have any provision to exempt information from disclosure merely on the ground that it is in a sealed cover, the public authority cannot choose to deny such information," Das said in his application.

In this context, he also referred to a decision of the Central Information Commission in KK Agnihotri v. Ministry of Communication & IT, where it was held,

"if the desired information is kept in a sealed cover and it is not otherwise covered by any of the exemption provisions, then it must be disclosed after opening the cover."

In its reply, the CPIO, Supreme Court said that Das was not a party to the judicial proceedings. Further, information with respect to any judicial matter may be sought only by moving an application under the Supreme Court Rules, 2013. Even otherwise, the information is exempted under the RTI Act.

It may be noted that the suo moto case to probe into the "larger conspiracy" behind the allegations was closed by the Supreme Court last month, in view of Justice Patnaik's report.

On the claims made Advocate Utsav Bains that he was approached by certain "fixers" and "plotters" to file complaint against Gogoi, Patnaik had said, "it is not possible to find corroborative material qua the allegations of Mr. Utsav Singh Bains made in the affidavit".

In the order closing the proceedings, the Supreme Court noted that Justice A.K. Patnaik has not been able to obtain various records including electronic records of Whatsapp, Telegram etc. 

The report also referred to letter of the Director of the Intelligence Bureau which stated on account of the then Chief Justice of India taking serious tough decisions like in the case relating to National Register of Citizens (NRC), there was strong reason to believe that persons who were unhappy with those decisions hatched a conspiracy against the then Chief Justice of India.

Thus, this time the RTI was not able to penetrate the judicial shield. The mention was made to Section 8(1)(b), 8(1)(j) and Section 11(1) of the Right to Information Act, 2005, to deny information to the applicant.

 

8. (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen,—

(b) information which has been expressly forbidden to be published by any court of law or tribunal or the disclosure of which may constitute contempt of court; 

(j) information which relates to personal information the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual unless the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority, as the case may be, is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information:

Provided that the information which cannot be denied to the Parliament or a State Legislature shall not be denied to any person.

11. (1) Where a Central Public Information Officer or a State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, intends to disclose any information or record, or part thereof on a request made under this Act, which relates to or has been supplied by a third party and has been treated as confidential by that third party, the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, shall, within five days from the receipt of the request, give a written notice to such third party of the request and of the fact that the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, intends to disclose the information or record, or part thereof, and invite the third party to make a submission in writing or orally, regarding whether the information should be disclosed, and such submission of the third party shall be kept in view while taking a decision about disclosure of information:

Provided that except in the case of trade or commercial secrets protected by law, disclosure may be allowed if the public interest in disclosure outweighs in importance any possible harm or injury to the interests of such third party.

 

3.    Court Rules & RTI 

The Supreme Court through J. R. Bhanumati  has ruled that if a citizen (not a party to the case) wants copies of judicial proceedings, he cannot get it by asking for it in RTI but through the Rules of Court.¹³

All High Courts and the Supreme Court have certain rules for conducting their proceedings. Most of them have had a rule stating that parties in a suit may get copies relating to their case. However, those who are not parties to the suit may obtain these if they give an affidavit stating their reasons for seeking this information. If the Court was satisfied with the reasons for seeking information, it would provide it. 

  

DETAILS OF CASE:

In the present case, a respondent (third party) applied for certified copies to be obtained from the High Court by invoking the provisions of Right to Information Act without resorting to Gujarat High Court Rules prescribed by the High Court. 

In reply the Public Information Officer, Gujarat High Court informed respondent that for obtaining required copies, he should make an application personally or through his advocate on affixing court fees stamp with requisite fee to the “Deputy Registrar”. 

It was further stated that as respondent is not a party to the said proceedings, as per Rule 151 of the Gujarat High Court Rules, 1993, his application should be accompanied by an affidavit stating the grounds for which the certified copies are required and on making such application, he will be supplied the certified copies of the documents as per Rules 149 to 154 of the Gujarat High Court Rules, 1993. 

The respondent thus preferred an appeal before the Appellate Authority-Registrar Administration under Section 19 of the Right to Information Act, 2005. 

The appeal was dismissed vide order on the ground that for obtaining certified copies, the alternative efficacious remedy is already available under the Gujarat High Court Rules, 1993 and that under the provisions of RTI Act, no certified copies can be provided. 

The respondent then filed a second appeal before the Appellant-Chief Information Commissioner and notice was sent to High Court. 

The High Court stated the rules regarding the process of obtaining certified copies and  that the Public Information Officer cannot be compelled to breach the High Court Rules and hence, the appeal filed before the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) is liable to be dismissed. 

Relying upon Sections 6(2) and 22 of the RTI Act, the appellant-Chief Information Commissioner directed Public Information Officer of the Gujarat High Court to provide the information sought by respondent.

This order of CIC was challenged before the Hon’ble High Court. The learned Single Judge, while admitting he petition, passed an interim order to provide the information sought by respondent.

Being aggrieved by the interim order, High Court preferred Letters Patent before the Division Bench contending that the party who seeks certified copies has to make an application along with the copying charges and requisite court fees stamp as per Rules 149 to 154 of the Gujarat High Court Rules. 

Vide impugned order, the High Court allowed the Letters Patent Appeal holding that when a particular field is governed by the rules which are not declared ultra-vires, then there is no question of applying the fresh rules and make the situation confusing. 

The High Court held that in the light of the High Court Rules, certified copies may be given on payment of charges as per the Rules and also the applicant (respondent No.2) has to file an affidavit disclosing the purpose for which the certified copies are required and there is no question of making an application under the RTI Act. 

The Division Bench set aside the order of the Chief Information Commissioner by observing that when a copy is demanded by any person, the same has to be in accordance with the Rules of the High Court on the subject. 

As the question was concerned with all the High Courts and having regard to the importance of the matter information was obtained about the Rules framed by various High Courts in exercise of their power under Article 225 of the Constitution of India and under Section 28 of the Right to Information Act, 2005. 

 

 

Contentions before the Supreme Court: 

1.     Section 6(2) of the RTI Act specifically provided that an applicant making a request for information shall not be required to give reasons for requesting the information sought and whereas under the Gujarat High Court Rules, applications made by third parties seeking copies of the documents shall be accompanied by an affidavit stating the grounds on which they are required and there is direct inconsistency between the provisions of the RTI Act and the Gujarat High Court Rules, 1993. 

 

2.     Section 22 of the RTI Act specifically provides that the provisions of the RTI Act will have an overriding effect over any other laws for the time being in force.

 

3.     The High Court Rules have been framed in exercise of the powers under Article 225 of the Constitution of India which would be subject to any other law and the non-obstante clause in Section 22 of the RTI Act shows that the provisions of the RTI Act would override the High Court Rules. On the other hand apprehension that allowing an applicant to seek information from the High Court under RTI Act can prejudicially affect the privacy/rights of other parties or the administration of justice was doubtful.

 

4.     It was also contended that when an efficacious remedy is available under Rule 151 of the Gujarat High Court Rules which is in consonance with the provisions of RTI Act, the provisions of the RTI Act cannot be invoked.

 

5.     Another stand was taken that although Section 22 of the RTI Act has an overriding effect over any other laws, in case there are inconsistencies, Section 22 of the RTI Act does not contemplate to override those legislations which also aim to ensure access to information. 

 

SUPREME COURT HELD

The Supreme Court held that insofar as the RTI Act is concerned, in exercise of the powers under Section 28 of the RTI Act, various High Courts have framed the Rules under RTI Act and the information on the administrative side of the High Court can be accessed as per the Rules framed by the High Courts under RTI Act. Thus, in the view of the Apex Court there is no inconsistency between the provisions of the RTI Act with the Rules framed by the High Court in exercise of the powers under Article 225 of the Constitution of India. 

 

The various categories of information held by the High Court, which are broadly as under:- 

(a)  information held by the High Court relating to the parties to the litigation/proceedings – pleadings, documents and other materials and memo of grounds raised by the parties; 

(b)  orders and judgments passed by the High Court, notes of proceedings, etc.; 

(c)  In exercise of power of superintendence over the other courts and tribunals, information received in the records submitted/called for by those courts and tribunals like subordinate judiciary, various tribunals like Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Customs Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal and other tribunals; 

(d)  information on the administrative side of the High Court viz. appointments, transfers and postings of the judicial officers, staff members of the High Court and the district judiciary, disciplinary action taken against the judicial officers and the staff members and such other information relating to the administrative work. 

(e)  Correspondence by the High Court with the Supreme Court, Government and with the district judiciary, etc.; and

(f) Information on the administrative side as to the decision taken by the collegium of the High Court in making recommendations of the Judges to be appointed to the High Court; information as to the assets of the sitting Judges held by the Chief Justice of the High Court. 

 

·      Information on the judicial side can be accessed/certified copies of documents and orders could be obtained by the parties to the proceedings in terms of the High Court Rules and the parties to the proceedings are entitled to the same. 

 

·      So far as the third parties are concerned, as of right, they are not entitled to access the information/obtain the certified copies of documents, orders and other proceedings. As per rules framed by the High Court, a third party can obtain the certified copies of the documents, orders or judgments or can have access to the information only by filing an application/affidavit and by stating the reason for which the information/copies of documents or orders are required. 

 

·      Insofar as on the administrative side i.e. categories (d), (e) and (f), one can have access to the information or copies of the documents could be obtained under the rules framed by the various High Courts or under the rules framed by the High Court under the RTI Act. 

 

·      Insofar as the disclosure of information as to the assets of the Judges held by the Chief Justice of the High Court, the same is now covered by the judgment of the Constitution Bench reported in Central Public Information Officer, Supreme Court of India v. Subhash Chandra Agrawal 2019 (16) SCALE 40.

 

·      The information is held by the High Court as a trustee for the litigants in order to adjudicate upon the matter and administer justice. The same cannot be permitted by the third party to have access to such personal information of the parties or information given by the Government in the proceedings. Lest, there would be misuse of process of court and the information and it would reach unmanageable levels. 

·      The object of the RTI Act itself recognizes the need to protect the institutional interest and also to make optimum use of limited fiscal resources and preservation of confidentiality of sensitive information. 

 

·      The information held by the High Court on the judicial side are the “personal information” of the litigants like title cases and family court matters, etc. Under the guise of seeking information under the RTI Act, the process of the court is not to be abused and information not to be misused. 

 

·      The Right to Information Act has not repealed the Official Secrets Act or any of the laws providing confidentiality which prohibits the authorities to disclose information. Therefore, all those enactments including Official Secrets Act, 1923 continue to be in force. This Act however, has an overriding effect to the extent they are inconsistent. 

 

·      The non-obstante clause of the RTI Act does not mean an implied repeal of the High Court Rules and Orders framed under Article 225 of the Constitution of India; but only has an overriding effect in case of inconsistency. 

 

·      Section 31 of the RTI Act repeals only the Freedom of Information Act, 2002 and not other laws. 

 

·      In the RTI Act, there is no specific reference to the rules framed by the various High Courts or any other special law excepting the Freedom of Information Act, 2002. 

 

 

Views of Shailesh Gandhi (former Central Information Commissioner):

According to Shailesh Gandhi¹⁴ (former Central Information Commissioner), the decision will likely to have a very negative implication on the citizen's fundamental Right to Information. In his humble submission RTI has been accepted as a fundamental right of citizens under Article 19 (1)(a). This covers right to free speech, right to publish and right to information. A citizen does not have to give reasons for exercising any of these, and some reasonable restrictions on all these can be imposed on these as laid down in Article 19 (2). In line with this the RTI Act has specific exemptions u/s 8 in the Act and only these exemptions could be used to deny information to a citizen. 

To ensure that other laws and constraints could not be used to deny information to the rulers of democracy,-the citizens,- parliament provided a non- obstante clause in Section 22 

He also contends that the Supreme Court judgment does not clearly identify how it has concluded that the Supreme Court and High Court rules are not inconsistent with the RTI Act. Instead the Court has concluded that if any law or rule provides for providing information, it would be held to be consistent with the RTI Act. 

Various public authorities could make the RTI Act irrelevant by creating their own rules for giving information. This ruling also violates a basic premise that if there are more than one route for an activity, it is the citizen's choice to choose the route. 

The Supreme Court, on various occasions, has ruled that it is incumbent on public sector institutions to be model employers following all laws in letter and spirit. It is humbly submitted that the Supreme Court should become a role model in implementation of the provisions of the Right to Information Act, 2005 in its true letter and spirit and inspire all public authorities to follow its lead in transparency. 

 

Conclusion

In the course of this article, we tried to have an insight into how the Judicial organ of the ‘state' eventually came under the ambit of the Right to Information Act, 2005. RTI, as it is evident, performs important functions in a democracy by enhancing citizen's ability to participate in the process. 

We also discussed about the situation where a probe report was denied in RTI which dealt into the "larger conspiracy" behind the sexual harassment allegations levelled against the then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi. 

 There was also a discussion about a recent judgement wherein it was held, if a citizen (not a party to the case) wants copies of judicial proceedings, he cannot get it by asking for it in RTI but through the Rules of Court.

This read in toto makes us understand that though the Office of CJI is a public authority and a subject matter of RTI, but there may be other situations where Court may deny information, or would ask to follow another route to get the information. It is not to be forgotten that the Right to Information is a fundamental right and thus is subject to Article 19 (2), but it is nevertheless fundamental in nature. Also the doctrine of check and balance which can be said as the basis of constitutional morality needs to be preserved. Thus, the doctrine of proportionality is to be followed while disallowing a request for information along with upholding other rights of fundamental importance including privacy as well as striking a balance with the independence of judiciary which is the basic structure of the constitution.

¹ Justice L. Nageswara Rao,  Freedom of Speech and Expression under the Indian Constitution, 3rd G.L. Sanghi Memorial Lecture was organised by the University, Held on  (Dr. Vasantrao Deshpande Hall, Civil Lines, Nagpur on October 19, 2019), available at https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/free-flow-of-thought-and-expression-149086 (last visited on April 28, 2021).

 

² Central Public Information Officer v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal, 2019 SCC OnLine SC 1459, decided on 13.11.2019.

³ Section 24, The Right to Information Act, 2005. 

⁴  Should Judiciary Come Under The Purview Of RTI ?, available at ^:https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2019/04/balancing-the-right-to-information-and-judiciary/ (last visited on April 28, 2021).

⁵ Chronology of events in office of Chief Justice of India falling under RTI Act case, available at: https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/chronology-of-events-in-office-of-chief-justice-of-india-falling-under-rti-act-case/article29963384.ece (last visited April 29, 2021).

⁶ RTI and Judiciary, available at: http://www.legalserviceindia.com/legal/article-3673-rti-and-judiciary.html (last visited: April 28, 2021).

⁷ Ibid notes 6.

⁸ Central Public Information Officer Supreme Court of India v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal, 2019 SCC OnLine SC 1459.

⁹ Article124, The Constitution of India,1950. 

¹⁰ Ibid notes 6.

¹¹ Judicial independence, motive & purpose, surveillance — how SC argues for and against RTI, available at: https://theprint.in/judiciary/judicial-independence-motive-purpose-surveillance-how-sc-argues-for-and-against-rti/320802/ (last visited: April 28, 2021).

¹² Section8(e),The Right to Information Act, 2005.

¹³ Chief Information Commissioner vs High Court Of Gujarat, Civil Appeal No(S).1966-1967 of 2020. 

¹⁴ Court Rules & RTI : SC Verdict Subverts Right To Information, available at: https://www.livelaw.in/columns/court-rules-rti-sc-verdict-subverts-right-to-information-153710 (last visited: April 28, 2021).