Leave granted to an officer and his participation in some conference while being on leave - the details of leave and the period for which it had been granted to be provided - the contents of the leave application are personal and cannot be shared
21 Aug, 2013Leave granted to an officer and his participation in some conference while being on leave - the details of leave and the period for which it had been granted to be provided - the contents of the leave application are personal and cannot be shared - if the officer had attended the conference privately and not in his official capacity or if the Central Government had not deputed him for this purpose or reimbursed the cost of his travel etc, no details about his attending the conference can be provided
Order
1. In his RTI application, the Appellant had raised a number of queries regarding the leave granted to Sri LR Vishwanath and his participation in some conference organised on 10 and 11 December 2011 by Sri Vidya Pratisthanam in Kerala. The CPIO had informed him that the competent authority have granted leave to Sri LR Vishwanath. However, he did not consider it necessary to provide any information against the remaining queries on the ground that it was third party information. Not satisfied with this response, the Appellant had preferred an appeal. The Appellate Authority had disposed of the appeal by endorsing the stand taken by the CPIO and also by holding that the desired information was personal in nature.
2. We have carefully gone through the contents of the RTI request. The entire matter revolves around the fact that Sri LR Vishwanath had attended some conference while on leave. The Appellant wants to know about the details of that leave and also if the officer concerned had been permitted to take part in the conference. He has every right to know if the officer had been granted any leave and the period for which it had been granted. However, the contents of the leave application cannot be shared with him being entirely the personal information of the officer concerned. Similarly, if the officer had attended the conference privately and not in his official capacity or if the Central Government had not deputed him for this purpose or reimbursed the cost of his travel etc, no details about his attending the conference can be provided not only because such information would not be available in the Ministry but also because this is the personal information of the officer concerned. Keeping all this in view, we think it would be sufficient if the CPIO would inform him within 10 working days of receiving this order the exact sanction given by the competent authority including the nature of the leave and the period for which it had been granted.
(Satyananda Mishra)
Chief Information Commissioner
Citation: Sh. Ajit Maniyan v. Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in Case No.CIC/SM/A/2013/000325