Central Information Commission
Complaint No.CIC/PB/A/2008/00839-SM dated 13.11.2007
Right to Information Act-2005-Under Section (18)
Dated: 25 June 2009
Name of the Complainant : Shri Kuldip Sharma, Gurdaspur, Punjab
Name of the Public : CPIO, State Bank of Patiala
Authority
The Complainant was not present.
On behalf of the Respondent, Shri Ashok Gupta, was present.
The brief facts of the case are as under.
This case was posted for hearing today. The Appellant was not present.
The Respondent was present and submitted that the CIC had already decided
this matter in the past by its order dated 5 November 2007 in the appeal number
1091/ICPB/07/865 and had given certain directions regarding the disclosure of
marks awarded to the successful candidates as well as the Appellant in the
departmental promotion exercise. The Respondent submitted that the directions
of the CIC had been complied with and the details of the marks had been
disclosed to the Appellant. In spite of the disclosure of aggregate marks awarded
to all successful candidates, he, once again, went before the CPIO in his
application dated 13 November 2007 seeking disaggregate marks instead. This
CPIO replied to him on 2 January 2008 and provided him with the marks secured
by all the successful candidates. Not satisfied with the reply, he had sent an
appeal to the Appellate Authority on 3 March 2008 which that Authority had
disposed of in his order dated 15 March 2008 by referring to the decision of the
CIC as stated above. The Appellant has approached the CIC again in second
appeal seeking the breakup of the marks awarded to each successful candidate
and to himself.
2. It is a fact that the Appellant had come before the CIC in the past seeking
the same information and the CIC had not agreed to provide the breakup of
CIC/PB/A/2008/00839-SM
marks secured by the candidates in the departmental promotion exercise. What
was allowed for disclosure was the aggregate marks secured by the successful
candidates. The Respondent argued that the disclosure of the breakup of marks
of all the successful candidates, specially the marks secured in the interview,
would result in avoidable rancour and ill will among the employees leading to
inevitable comparison among the candidates. To that extent, he argued that the
breakup of marks secured by the candidates was in the nature of personal
information having no relationship to any public activity of interest and had the
potential of causing unwarranted invasion of the privacy of third-parties, in this
case, other successful candidates and, therefore, exempt from disclosure under
Section 8(1) (j) of the Right to Information (RTI) Act. While there is some force in
this argument, we feel that the Public Authority should at least convey the
breakup of the marks secured by the Appellant himself in this exercise as every
candidate should know his or her own marks so as to be able to improve in
future. In view of this, we direct the CPIO to convey to the Appellant within 10
working days from the receipt of this order, the breakup of marks secured by the
Appellant himself in the above departmental promotion exercise.
3. With the above direction, the appeal is disposed off.
4. Copies of this order be given free of cost to the parties.
(Satyananda Mishra)
Information Commissioner
Authenticated true copy. Additional copies of orders shall be supplied
against application and payment of the charges prescribed under the Act to
the CPIO of this Commission.
(Vijay Bhalla)
Assistant Registrar
Copy to:
1. Shri Kuldip Sharma, Single Window Operator, State Bank of India, State
Bank of Patiala, Harchowal Chowk, Qadian, Distt. Gurdaspur, Punjab
2. The CPIO, & DGM, State Bank of Patiala, Head Office, The Hall, Patiala,
Punjab.
CIC/PB/A/2008/00839-SM