The New Indian Express: Chennai: Sunday, April 21, 2013.
An order of
the Tamil Nadu Information Commission (TNIC) of January 2012 directing the
Madras High Court Registrar-General to furnish to an RTI applicant details
relating to complaints of bribery in the subordinate judiciary was rejected by
the Madras High Court.
In an order
allowing a writ petition by the Registrar-General challenging the TNIC
direction of January 10 last, a division bench comprising Justices Elipe Dharma
Rao and M Venugopal said that they were not agreeable with the TNIC’s order.
The TNIC order was not sustainable in the eye of law, the bench said.
Advocate K
Elango, also former Assistant Solicitor-General of India and Special Government
Pleader of the Madras High Court, among other things posed questions which
included whether there was any mechanism
to trap judicial officers and court staff of receiving bribery and the
number of complaints received by the Registry and the Vigilance department
between 2001 and 2010. How many complaints ended in dismissal, suspension or
issue of memo and dropping of cases and conviction during the period. The
applicant also wanted to know the number of complaints against High Court staff
against whom complaints of corruption had been received.
The
Registrar-General submitted that the TNIC had failed to app reciate an
important fact that the information sought for infringed the High Court’s
internal administration.
The bench
said the information asked for had no relationship to any public activity.
Also, it was not to a fuller extent open to the public. If the information
sought for was furnished, it would open the floodgates of similar applications.
Therefore, some self-restrictions were to be imposed with regard to furnishing
the information. Further, if the information asked for was given, then, it
would have an adverse impact on the regular and normal serene functioning of the
High Court. Also, the secrecy and privacy of the internal working process might
get jeopardised, the bench said.
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