In a big win for Delhi University, the Delhi High Court on Monday set aside a CIC order directing disclosure of information on the bachelor’s degree of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
A single judge bench of Justice Sachin Datta pronounced the order.
During the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared for DU, argued the CIC order deserved to be set aside for the “right to privacy" superseded the “right to know". Mehta, however, had said the university was willing to show to the court its record pertaining to Modi’s degree but cannot disclose the same for “scrutiny by strangers" under the RTI law.
Following an RTI application by one Neeraj, the Central Information Commission (CIC) on December 21, 2016, allowed inspection of records of all students who cleared the BA exam in 1978 — the year Prime Minister Modi also passed it. The high court stayed the CIC order on January 23, 2017.
DU challenged the CIC order on the ground that it held the information of students in a fiduciary capacity and “mere curiosity" in the absence of public interest did not entitle anyone to seek private information under the RTI law.
Earlier, the counsel for the RTI applicants had defended the CIC’s order on the ground that the Right to Information (RTI) Act provided for disclosure of the prime minister’s educational information in the greater public good.
