Judges independence should be safegaurded: Attorney General

The Supreme Court told the Delhi High Court that rights of Judiciary should be safeguarded while seeking any query under the Right To Information Act. 



Attorney General G E Vahanvati, who was arguing a case relating to the disclosure of Judges assets under the RTI Act, told the court, ‘There is no doubt that the public has a right to know but at the same time, what about the rights and privileges granted to the judges?’ The Judiciary’s rights should also be protected and proper safeguards should be made so that the information sought is not misused, Mr Vahanvati contended.



The information which is within the control of a public authority should be given under the Right To Information (RTI) Act but, at the same time, the consideration of independence of judiciary should be kept in mind, he said. 



A bench comprising Chief Justice A P Shah, Justices S Muralidhar and Vikramjit Sen heard the arguments of an appeal filed by the Supreme Court registry challenging the Delhi High Court’s Single Judge order, which states that office of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) comes within the purview of the RTI Act. 



‘RTI and information are two different things and should not be mixed. There is a twin test as one is information held by a public authority and the other is information under the control of public authority,’ Mr Vahanvati said. 



Stating that the Judges have voluntarily declared their assets and all information regarding the same was on the website, Mr Vahanvati said, ‘The resolution of 1997 adopted by the Supreme Court Judges is non-constitutional and non-binding on the Judges, as it states that the Judges should voluntarily file records of their assets.’ The court asked Mr Vahanvati whether the resolution made it mandatory for the family members of Judges to also declare their assets? To this, he replied the resolution was not clear about this. 



The lawyer for S C Aggarwal on whose RTI query the Central Information Commission (CIC) held that CJI office comes under the RTI Act, said there were more specific rules regarding the evaluation of assets and should be calculated from the time the assets have been acquired and not on the present day prices. 



But the court held that the information made available on the website was enough for the public. The arguments would continue.