2018 (7) TMI 1221

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..... of the RTI Act, 2005 with due diligence and care - appeal disposed off.
Mr Bimal Julka, Information Commissioner ORDER FACTS: The Appellant vide his RTI application sought information on 03 points (A i to iii) regarding the Hon'ble Punjab & Haryana High Court order dated 20.03.2017, who had directed the CBEC to place the data regarding the date of receipt of samples, dates on which the samples were tested and the date on which the reports were sent to the Commissioners by the Central Revenue Control Laboratories during the last one year, numbers of samples received by the Central Revenue Control Laboratories during the period of 2016 and 2017 till 31.03.2017 and issues related thereto. The CPIO vide letter dated 28.04.2017 provided .....

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..... her to appear in the Court in person. Thereafter, in another hearing Hon'ble Court had monitored the functioning of CRCL, IARI, Pusa Campus, New Delhi raising concerns about the facility to test samples of different categories of products for which the testing facilities were not available in CRCL. The matter still under adjudication with Hon'ble Court with the next date of hearing fixed to 18.05.2018. Therefore, considering the seriousness of the whole matter, it is indeed unfortunate that the CPIO and the FAA had dealt with the issue very casually. The Commission observed that as per the provisions of the RTI Act, 2005, no specific exemption is codified which allows non-disclosure of information on the ground that the matter on which in .....

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..... I Act. Section 8(1) (b) of the RTI Act exempts from disclosure "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". From a plain reading of Section 8(1)(b) of the RTI Act, it is clear that it does not include sub- judice matters. As mentioned above, information may be exempted from disclosure in accordance with Section 8 and 9 only and no other exemptions can be claimed while rejecting a demand for disclosure. Hence, disclosing information on matters which are sub- judice cannot constitute contempt of Court, unless there is a specific order forbidding its disclosure. The mere claim that a matter is sub- judice cannot be used as a reason .....

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