Times of India: Chennai: Thursday, 25 April 2024.
Answer keys for the Combined Civil Services (Group I) Mains examination conducted by Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC) are not public documents and they cannot be accessed under the Right To Information (RTI) Act, the Tamil Nadu State Information Commission has ruled.
The commission dismissed an appeal filed by an aspirant after recording the submission of TNPSC’s under secretary/public information officer Baskarapandian that the information sought was confidential in nature as “they are set by examiners and the evaluation is also done by the examiners themselves. Hence, such information could not be furnished to the petitioner.” The commission said the document cannot be placed under the ambit of the ‘public document’ and therefore the information sought cannot be given as such.
H Hemakumar, a resident of Anna Nagar had in 2020 sought evaluation guidelines and Mains answer key set by the TNPSC for evaluating the general studies paper I, paper 2 and paper 3 through RTI. However, TNPSC’s public information officer rejected the application and his first appeal too was rejected by the appellate authority, stating that it is a set of guidelines given by TNPSC to evaluators to assess the descriptive answer and cannot be considered as an answer key.
In 2021, the second appeal was filed before the commission and it first came up for hearing in Jan this year. The perusal of records showed that TNPSC did not give any guidelines to the evaluators to assess the descriptive answers, but evaluators themselves prepared notes to ensure uniformity and to have better clarity during evaluation.
The PIO was summoned again in this regard on April 10 and under secretary Baskarapandian appeared before the commission and said it was a mistake on their part to state that the guidelines to evaluate descriptive answers were issued by TNPSC.
“Descriptive type examinations have been set up by a committee of three members comprising assistant professors, associate professors and professors working in govt/aided colleges with minimum 15 years of experience, and they are in the form of hints which are indicative in nature,” the official submitted.
The commission accepted the official’s submission that the document sought is confidential in nature and dismissed the petition.
Answer keys for the Combined Civil Services (Group I) Mains examination conducted by Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC) are not public documents and they cannot be accessed under the Right To Information (RTI) Act, the Tamil Nadu State Information Commission has ruled.
The commission dismissed an appeal filed by an aspirant after recording the submission of TNPSC’s under secretary/public information officer Baskarapandian that the information sought was confidential in nature as “they are set by examiners and the evaluation is also done by the examiners themselves. Hence, such information could not be furnished to the petitioner.” The commission said the document cannot be placed under the ambit of the ‘public document’ and therefore the information sought cannot be given as such.
H Hemakumar, a resident of Anna Nagar had in 2020 sought evaluation guidelines and Mains answer key set by the TNPSC for evaluating the general studies paper I, paper 2 and paper 3 through RTI. However, TNPSC’s public information officer rejected the application and his first appeal too was rejected by the appellate authority, stating that it is a set of guidelines given by TNPSC to evaluators to assess the descriptive answer and cannot be considered as an answer key.
In 2021, the second appeal was filed before the commission and it first came up for hearing in Jan this year. The perusal of records showed that TNPSC did not give any guidelines to the evaluators to assess the descriptive answers, but evaluators themselves prepared notes to ensure uniformity and to have better clarity during evaluation.
The PIO was summoned again in this regard on April 10 and under secretary Baskarapandian appeared before the commission and said it was a mistake on their part to state that the guidelines to evaluate descriptive answers were issued by TNPSC.
“Descriptive type examinations have been set up by a committee of three members comprising assistant professors, associate professors and professors working in govt/aided colleges with minimum 15 years of experience, and they are in the form of hints which are indicative in nature,” the official submitted.
The commission accepted the official’s submission that the document sought is confidential in nature and dismissed the petition.
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