Employee's Performance Is "Personal Information" Exempted U/S 8(1)(j) RTI Act: J&K&L High Court
Live LawThe Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh High Court on Saturday reiterated that the "performance of an employee or an officer in an organisation is primarily a matter between the employee and the employer and falls within the meaning of personal information." While the Public Information Officer of KVS on 1 March 2014 declined to provide the information on the ground that the information sought for qualifies as "personal information" within the meaning of provisions of Section 8 of the RTI Act, the applicant preferred appeals, which came to be allowed by the Central Information Commission on 14 February 2017. "After going through the file and the relevant clause of Right to Information Act, we are in agreement that the information sought for by the respondent falls under the expression personal information and the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or public interest, rather it would cause unwarranted invasion of privacy of that individual," the Court said. "Normally those aspects are governed by the service rules which fall under the expression "personal information", the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or public interest," the court said, adding, "On the other hand, the disclosure of which would cause unwarranted invasion of privacy of that individual." Buttressing the said position of law the bench found it worthwhile to record the observations of Supreme Court in Girish Ramchandra Deshpande vs Central Information Commr., 2013 wherein it was observed, "The performance of an employee/officer in an organization is primarily a matter between the employee and the employer and normally those aspects are governed by the service rules which fall under the expression "personal information", the disclosure of which has no relationship to any public activity or public interest.