Central Information Commission
Mr. Swapan Bandyopadhyay vs Union Public Service Commission on 15 January, 2013
Central Information Commission, New Delhi
File No.CIC/SM/A/2012/001070
Right to Information Act2005Under Section (19)
Date of hearing : 15 January 2013
Date of decision : 15 January 2013
Name of the Appellant : Shri Swapan Bandyopadhyay,
C122/AI, Shalimar Garden,
ExII, Sahibabad, Ghaziabad,
UP - 201 005.
Name of the Public Authority : CPIO, Union Public Service Commission,
(Sangh Lok Seva Ayog), Dholpur House,
Shahjahan Road, New Delhi - 110 069.
The Appellant was present in person.
On behalf of the Respondent, Shri Shakti Shamsher, Under Secretary
was present.
Chief Information Commissioner : Shri Satyananda Mishra
2. Both the parties were present during the hearing. We heard their submissions.
3. In respect of the combined Steno/SO limited departmental examination conducted in the years 2006, 2007 and 2008, the Appellant had sought a number of information, such as, the prescribed eligibility conditions for general candidates for qualifying in the written part of the examination, if the result in respect of the Appellant himself had been kept on hold, his total score and the CIC/SM/A/2012/001070 marks awarded to him in each paper as well as those of all other candidates. The CPIO had replied to him with the observation that the eligibility conditions had already been advertised in the notice inviting applications for this examination and the information in respect of the marks secured by various candidates would be available only after the examination process was complete. He had also informed him that he had not cleared the written part of the examination. The Appellate Authority had endorsed the response of the CPIO.
4. During the hearing, the Respondent admitted that the examination process was now over. Now that the exemption process is complete, the marks secured by the recommended candidates as well as the evaluated answer sheets of the Appellant himself could be disclosed. However, the Respondent informed us that the UPSC had got a stay from the Supreme Court against an order passed by the Kerala High Court on 23 November 2012 in the SLA (C) No. 33761/2012 directing disclosure of evaluated answer sheets and, therefore, submitted that they should not be directed to provide these to the Appellant until the matter was finally decided by the Supreme Court. Although the stay granted in one case does not necessarily extend to other cases, we would rather go with the submissions of the Respondent and advise the Appellant to wait for the Supreme Court to decide this matter. However, there is no stay on the disclosure of the marks awarded to the selected candidates and, therefore, the CPIO can easily disclose that information. We direct the CPIO to provide to the Appellant within 10 working days of receiving this order the marks awarded to all the successful candidates based on the above examination.
5. In the meanwhile, we would like to direct the CPIO to ensure that the CIC/SM/A/2012/001070 UPSC preserves the evaluated answer sheets of the Appellant until the matter is finally decided by the Supreme Court.
6. The appeal is disposed off accordingly.
7. Copies of this order be given free of cost to the parties.
(Satyananda Mishra) Chief 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) Deputy Registrar CIC/SM/A/2012/001070