Central Information Commission
Aruna Kumar vs University Of Delhi on 28 September, 2018
के ीय सूचना आयोग
Central Information Commission
बाबा गंगनाथ माग
, मुिनरका
Baba Gangnath Marg, Munirka
नई द
ली, New Delhi - 110067
ि तीय अपील सं या / Second Appeal No.:- CIC/UODEL/A/2017/155637-BJ
Ms. Aruna Kumar
....अपीलकता
/Appellant
VERSUS
बनाम
CPIO,
Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma College,
(University of Delhi),
Dhaula Kuan, New Delhi 110021
... ितवादीगण /Respondent
Date of Hearing : 27.09.2018
Date of Decision : 28.09.2018
Date of RTI application 28.04.2017
CPIO's response 05.06.2017
Date of the First Appeal 23.06.2017
First Appellate Authority's response Not on record
Date of diarised receipt of Appeal by the Commission 10.08.2017
ORDER
FACTS:
The Appellant vide her RTI application sought information regarding her yearly confidential reports for the period from 2005 till 2016.
The CPIO, vide its letter dated 05.06.2017 provided a response received from the concerned department. Dissatisfied by the response, the Appellant approached the FAA. The order of the FAA, if any, is not on the record of the Commission.
HEARING:
Facts emerging during the hearing:
The following were present:
Appellant: Ms. Aruna Kumar (Sr. PA to Principal);
Respondent: Absent;Page 1 of 4
The Respondent remained absent during the hearing, despite prior intimation. The Appellant reiterated the contents of her RTI application and stated that false and incomplete information was provided to her. While referring to her reply dated 04/06.10.2017, the Appellant submitted that the response of the CPIO that the CR/APAR for the year 2006-07 and 2010-11 was not traceable was incorrect. Similarly, the reply that the APAR for the years from 2011 till 2016 had not been submitted by the employee as per the office records was incorrect since she had filed all her APARs for the aforementioned years and that they were either destroyed by the College Authorities or not provided for the sake of creating hurdles in her promotions and future career developments. The reply was neither tenable under law and nor as per APAR Guidelines prescribed by the Government of India. During the hearing, while alleging that the former as well as the present Principal had deliberately connived in creating hurdles in her promotion and future career development and consequent adverse repercussions, the Appellant prayed for an independent enquiry in the matter.
Having heard the Appellant at length and on perusal of the records, the Commission at the outset observed that an employee was entitled to access to his/her ACR/APAR. In the context of disclosure of entry in the employee's own ACR, the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India in the decision of Dev Dutt vs Union of India & Ors on 12 May, 2008, Civil Appeal No. 7631 OF 2002, had held as under "19. In our opinion, every entry in the A.C.R. of a public servant must be communicated to him within a reasonable period, whether it is a poor, fair, average, good or very good entry. This is because non-communication of such an entry may adversely affect the employee in two ways : (1) Had the entry been communicated to him he would know about the assessment of his work and conduct by his superiors, which would enable him to improve his work in future (2) He would have an opportunity of making a representation against the entry if he feels it is unjustified, and pray for its upgradation.
Hence non-communication of an entry is arbitrary, and it has been held by the Constitution Bench decision of this Court in Maneka Gandhi vs. Union of India (supra) that arbitrariness violates Article 14 of the Constitution.
20. Thus it is not only when there is a bench mark but in all cases that an entry (whether it is poor, fair, average, good or very good) must be communicated to a public servant, otherwise there is violation of the principle of fairness, which is the soul of natural justice. Even an outstanding entry should be communicated since that would boost the morale of the employee and make him work harder."
In the judgement of the Ld. Single Judge of the Hon'ble High Court of Delhi in R.K. Jain v. Union of India, W.P. 6756 of 2010 dated 08.12.2011 which was affirmed by the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India vide its aforementioned decision it was held as under:
"10. Therefore, except in cases involving overriding public interest, the ACR record of an officer cannot be disclosed to any person other than the officer himself/herself."Page 2 of 4
Furthermore, the Hon'ble High Court of Delhi in the matter of THDC India Ltd. vs. R.S. Raturi, W.P. (C) No. 903 dated 08.07.2014 had held as under:
12. However, this Court is of the view that the respondent is entitled to the contents of his own ACR after redaction of the names of the reviewing, reporting and accepting officers. In fact, another coordinate Bench of this Court in THDC India Ltd. v. T. Chandra Biswas 199 (2013) DLT 284 has held as under:-
9. While the learned counsel for the respondent has contended before me that the respondent ought to have been supplied with the ACRs for the period 2004 to 2007, the respondent has not assailed that part of the order of the CIC. In my view, while the contention of the respondent has merit, which is that she cannot be denied information with regard to her own ACRs and that information cannot fall in the realm of any of the exclusionary provisions cited before me by the learned counsel for the petitioner i.e. Section 8(1)(d), (e) and (j), there is a procedural impediment, in as much as, there is no petition filed to assail that part of the order passed by the CIC.
9.1. In my view, the right to obtain her own ACRs inheres in the respondent which cannot be denied to the respondent under the provisions of Section 8 (1)(d), (e) and (j) of the RTI Act. The ACRs are meant to inform an employee as to the manner in which he has performed in the given period and the areas which require his attention, so that he may improve his performance qua his work.
9.2 That every entry in the ACR of an employee requires to be disclosed whether or not an executive instruction is issued in that behalf-is based on the premise that disclosure of the contents of ACR results in fairness in action and transparency in public administration. See Dev Dutt vs. Union of India 8 SCC 725 at page 732, paragraph 13;
page 733, paragraph 17; and at page 737, paragraphs 36, 37 and 38." A reference can also be made to a recent decision of the Hon'ble High Court of Delhi in the matter of Mukesh Kumar vs. Chief Information Commission, CIC, W.P. (C) 10691/ 2016 dated 19.09.2017 wherein a reference was also made in this matter to the earlier decision in the matter of THDC India Ltd. vs. R.S. Raturi, W.P. (C) No. 903 dated 08.07.2014. The relevant extracts of the decision are as under:
"10. In view of the above, the controversy essentially remained with regard to the viva voce marks awarded by the Interview Committee to other candidates. In this context, the CIC relying on the decision of this Court in THDC India Limited v. R.K. Raturi: W.P.(C) 903/2013, held that third party information could not be disclosed.
11. This Court is of the view that the decision in the case of THDC India Ltd. (supra) is not applicable to the information sought by the petitioner. In that case the question was regarding ACR gradings /ratings considered in DPC proceedings. It is in that context that this Court had held that ACR gradings and the marks awarded in DPC proceeding could only be disclosed to the concerned employee and not to any other employee as that would constitute third party information. This Court had further held that such Page 3 of 4 information could be disclosed only if the CIC found that a larger public interest was involved and further after following the procedure prescribed under Section 11(1) and 19(4) of the Act.
15. Insofar as handwritten marks awarded by interview panel is concerned, those obviously from a part of the working papers of the interview panel and cannot be disclosed; disclosure of such handwritten record would also inevitably disclose the identity of the members of the interview panel, which as stated above cannot be disclosed to the petitioner."
The Respondent was not present to contest the submissions of the Appellant or to substantiate their claims further.
DECISION:
Keeping in view the facts of the case and the submissions made by the Appellant, the Commission instructs the Vice Chancellor, University of Delhi to nominate a suitable officer of an appropriate level to enquire into the matter and submit its report to the Appellant under intimation to the Commission, within a period of 30 days from the date of receipt of this order.
The Appeal stands disposed with the above direction.
Bimal Julka (िबमल जु का)
Information Commissioner (सूचना आयु )
Authenticated true copy
(अ भ मा णत स या पत त)
K.L. Das (के .एल.दास)
Dy. Registrar (उप-पंजीयक)
011-26182598/ [email protected]
दनांक / Date: 28.09.2018
Copy to:
1- The Vice Chancellor, University of Delhi, North Campus, Delhi-110007 2- The Registrar, University of Delhi, Main Campus, New Delhi - 110007 3- Dr. G. K. Jha, Principal, Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma College, (University of Delhi), Dhaula Kuan, New Delhi 110021 Page 4 of 4