Disclosure of leave records and attendance registers of employees under RTI

Background

The appellant sought information regarding leave applications of certain employees of Punjab & Sind Bank for appearing before Honourable Central Information Commission (CIC) and the High Court. He asked for documents like the certified copies of sanctioned leave application of some employees, copy of attendance register of the employees posted at LDA Branch, name & place of posting of the employee, name of the employee who was entrusted to hold the Cashier set of Cash keys during the absence of the said employees etc. He also sought a copy of the rules relied for paying the amount of Special Pay paid to an employee. The Public Information Officer (PIO) provided part information and denied for the rest under section 8(1)(j) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen, information which relates to personal information the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or interest, or which would cause unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the individual unless the Central Public Information Officer or the State Public Information Officer or the appellate authority, as the case may be, is satisfied that the larger public interest justifies the disclosure of such information: Provided that the information which cannot be denied to the Parliament or a State Legislature shall not be denied to any person. of the RTI Act. He also stated that the attendance register cannot be provided as it was third party information. During the hearing, the appellant stated that the sought information was related to certain official appearing before the CIC as appellants and the individual was being shown as present on the attendance register.

View of CIC

The Commission noted that information relating to leave and the attendance registers cannot be considered to be exempt information since this is the information regarding the public activity. Taking into the consideration the appellant’s contention that he was seeking information regarding people appearing before the Commission as appellants in their private capacity, it appears that the denial of information was with a purpose to hide the information. The Commission directed the PIO to provide the complete information to the appellant. Under section 19(8)(b) In its decision, the Central Information Commission or State Information Commission, as the case may be, has the power to require the public authority to compensate the complainant for any loss or other detriment suffered; of the RTI Act, the Commission awarded a compensation of Rs. 2000/- to the appellant for the loss and detriment suffered by him.

Citation: Mr. M. K. Sachan v. Punjab & Sind Bank in Decision No. CIC/SG/A/2012/000211/18093