The Wire: New Delhi: Wednesday, May 23, 2018.
Delhi
University has now taken to personally attacking the Right to Information (RTI)
activists who filed intervention applications in what has now famously come to
be known as the Narendra Modi degree case.
While an
affidavit submitted by registrar T.K. Das last month singled out the main
intervener for the attack, additional solicitor general (ASG) Tushar Mehta,
while appearing for the university in the Delhi high court, on Tuesday accused
all the three applicants RTI activists Anjali Bharadwaj, Nikhil Dey and
Amrita Johri of being “nothing but
busybodies or meddlesome interlopers … surreptitiously trying to intervene in
the present matter”.
HC refuses
to dismiss intervention without going into its merits
The ASG also
opposed the intervention tooth and nail, claiming that it should not be allowed
under any circumstances. When Justice Rajiv Shakder said legal points had been
raised by the applicants in the matter and at least their services could be
utilised as friends of the court or amicus curiae, DU’s counsel also opposed
any such idea.
Furthermore,
when asked for his response to the notice served in the matter, Mehta said he
had been served only one-and-a-half pages and not the 24 pages which were
supposed to be there. At this, Justice Shakder said that even he had gone
through the detailed notice. Mehta also opposed any arguments in the matter
though the lawyers for both the appellant Neeraj Sharma and the intervening
applicants were prepared for it. Finally, the judge posted the matter for
August 23 but said he cannot dismiss the intervention without going into its
merits and hearing it properly.
DU had
earlier overlooked how activists have intervened in other cases too
Incidentally,
the attacks on the activists in this case had begun in the last hearing itself.
Talking to The Wire, Bhardwaj said that in the last hearing, the petitioners
had been accused of not intervening in any other matter but only the Modi
degree case.
She said,
“Today, we also attached a list of cases in which we had intervened and these
included the matter of non-appointment of CIC and the Lokpal case in the high
court. We have also gone to the Supreme Court against the non appointment of
commissioners by information commissions across the country. In the Delhi Rozi
Roti Adhikar Abhiyaan again we had gone to court. But they were trying to make
it sound like we were intervening for the first time.”
Also, she
said, Delhi University is trying to make this a case about the PM’s degree. “We
have said that in this RTI application it is not just the prime minister’s
degree that has been sought, it is about the entire 1978 batch. So no one is
targeting any individual. It is just that PM has also said that he passed out
in 1978. But it is clear that they have resorted to personal attacks in both
the affidavit and in the court proceeding. It was done rather blatantly by the
ASG.”
Incidentally,
while the ASG mentioned all the three applicants, an affidavit submitted by the
registrar of Delhi University, T.K. Das, in early April in the matter, had
clearly targeted Bharadwaj alone.
Das had
categorically stated that “a mere assertion of the applicant that she is a
public spirited person and is interested in meaningful implementation of the
Right to Information Act is no legal ground warranting intervention of the
applicant in the present proceedings”. He had added that the “application for
intervention is devoid of merits and such liable to be dismissed at it
threshold”.
In its
affidavit, Delhi University had placed its reliance on the a Supreme Court
judgment in the Bar Council of Maharashtra v M.V. Dabholkar case (1975) in
which the court had held that “in the context of locus standi to apply for a
writ of certiorari, an applicant may ordinarily fall in any of these
categories: (i) “person aggrieved”; (ii) “stranger”; (iii) busybody or
meddlesome interloper. Persons in the last category are easily distinguishable
from those coming under the first two categories. Such persons interfere in
things which do not concern them. They masquerade as crusaders for justice.
They pretend to act in the name of pro bono public, though they have no
interest of the public or even of their own to protect.”
The citing of
the Supreme Court order by Das clearly illustrated that extent to which Delhi
University is willing to stop the information on students who are believed to
have graduated from Delhi University in 1978.
The citation
also showed the university’s scant regard towards an RTI activist of repute,
Anjali Bhardwaj (the first applicant), who, as a member of the National
Campaign for People’s Right to Information, has been at the forefront of the
transparency movement, the Right to Food campaign, and various accountability
exercises.
A Lady Shri
Ram College graduate, who obtained higher degrees from Oxford University and
the Delhi School of Economics, Bhardwaj is also the founding member of Satark
Nagrik Sangathan and has worked towards promotion of transparency in public
life by advocating the need for implementing the RTI Act, the Whistle Blowers
Protection Act, the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act 2013 and the Grievance Redressal
Bill. She is also an active Right to Food campaigner and regularly helps the
poor and marginalised fight the system and gain access to rations, pensions and
other entitlements.
For her part,
Bhardwaj said, “Maybe I was targeted because I am the first intervener and it
is ‘Anjali Bhardwaj and others versus…’.
But she
agreed that personal attacks have become a part of the case. “Today, they made
it clear that the interveners are meddlesome interlopers. The hearing also
started with their reading descriptions about us. Obviously they are carrying
out personal attacks,” she said.
HC had
issued notice to DU despite opposition from ASG
Earlier on
February 28 this year, the Delhi high court had issued notice to Delhi
University on the intervention filed by the RTI activists in the matter
relating to information about students who graduated from Delhi University in
1978 – the year Prime Minister Narendra Modi is said to have graduated,
according to his election affidavit.
Justice Shakdher
had issued notice despite Delhi University strongly opposing the request for
it. Appearing for the university then, Mehta had insisted that RTI activists
should not be allowed to intervene in the case. However, the counsel for the
intervenors had said this was an issue of grave public importance and that the
interpretation by the court would have serious ramifications on the RTI regime
in the country. It was also highlighted that similar interventions had been
allowed by the Delhi high court in matters relating to the appointment of the
chief information commissioner of the Central Information Commission (CIC)
under the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act.
The Wire had
earlier also reported how RTI activists had contended that Delhi University’s
challenge to the CIC order directing it to disclose the names of all students
who graduated with a BA degree in 1978, was bad in law. They had noted that
while such information was readily provided by prominent foreign universities,
Delhi University had also erred in citing various provisions of the RTI Act in
trying to block the disclosure of information, which is over 20 years old.
Delhi
University had challenged the CIC’s 2016 order on the grounds that it violated
the RTI Act’s provision pertaining to privacy (Section 8(1)(j)) that it is in
possession of the information being sought in a fiduciary capacity under
section 8(1)(e) of the Act.
CIC had
allowed inspection of DU’s 1978 BA degree records
In his order
of December 21, 2016, central information commissioner M. Sridhar Acharyulu had
allowed inspection of Delhi University’s 1978 BA degree records. Hearing the
RTI application by Neeraj Sharma, Acharyulu had overturned the DU central
public information officer’s (CPIO) decision to deny the sought information.
The university then contended that disclosure of its 1978 university records
would invade the privacy of students and that the information “has no
relationship to any public activity or interest”.
The CIC held
that the university could not provide any evidence or explain how such
information causes any “invasion of privacy”, and allowed for inspection of
records.
Soon after he
passed the order in the case, Acharyulu was divested of the charge of the human
resource development ministry. Though the chief information commissioner later
issued a notice allowing him to retain the power to intervene in HRD ministry
matters, RTI activists have urged that the reasons behind the move, widely
assumed to have been prompted by a nudge from outside the commission, be
disclosed.
Kejriwal
had accused PM of influencing departments
Subsequently,
Aam Aadmi Party leader and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal had also
written to the CIC alleging that the prime minister was influencing the
departments concerned not to release details about his degrees.
Treating his
letter as an RTI application, the CIC had then directed both Gujarat University
(GU) and Delhi University to give Modi’s roll numbers so that they could find
out the necessary details. Later, both DU and GU confirmed what Modi had stated
in his election affidavits. Copies of his degree certificates showed that he
had completed his BA from Delhi University in 1978 with a third division and
finished his MA in ‘Entire Political Science’ with a first division in 1983.
DU opposed
the CIC order citing privacy clause
The CIC order
was expected to provide finality, but DU opposed it and moved the Delhi high
court in appeal. The court on January 23, 2017 stayed the CIC order directing
disclosure of Modi’s degree records.
In its
petition, Delhi University had stated that the CIC order of December 21, 2016
had directed the “University of Delhi to facilitate inspection of relevant
register where complete information about result of all students, who have
passed in Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), in the year 1978 along with roll number,
names of students, father’s name and marks obtained is available and provide
certified copy of the extract of pages from the register”.
Delhi
University, therefore, “sought exemption from provision of the said information
under Section 8 (1)(e), (j) and Section 11 of the Act”, citing clauses
pertaining to privacy and its fiduciary capacity. In granting a stay, the high
court stated that Delhi University had contended it had “no difficulty” in
providing information on three points that concern the total numbers but when
it came to the fourth point, it objected to the demand saying that this
concerned “personal information” of all students and was thus exempt from
disclosure.
The high
court noted that the additional solicitor general, while appearing for Delhi
University, had contended that even if the said information was not held in
fiduciary capacity, disclosure of personal information could only be directed
after compliance of provisions of sections 8(1)(j) and section 11 of the Act,
which require issuance of a notice and provision of an opportunity of hearing
to the individual concerned about whom the information is sought.
RTI
activists plea says DU’s stand based on incorrect interpretation of law
Before the
matter was listed again for hearing toward the end of 2017, the three RTI
activists filed an intervention plea in the matter. They stated that DU’s stand
was at variance with major universities across the globe which freely share
information on their students’ performance.
The RTI
activists also claimed that Delhi University’s petition was based on an
incorrect interpretation of law and ran contrary to the manner in which Delhi
University dealt with such information at present. They also pointed out that
the university had at the time of obtaining the stay ignored section 8(3) of
the RTI Act, which provides for the lifting of most of the exemptions if the
information sought for pertains to matters that are over 20 years old.
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