Right to Information Act, 2005— Sections 2(f) and 6—Scope of getting any information

An applicant can get any information which is already in existence and accessible to the public authority under law— An applicant is entitled to get copy of the opinions, advices, circulars, orders, etc.—He cannot ask for any information as to why such opinions, advices, circulars, orders, etc. have been passed, especially in matters pertaining to judicial decisions.

 A judge speaks through his judgments or orders passed by him. If any party feels aggrieved by the order/judgment passed by a judge, the remedy available to such a party is either to challenge the same by way of appeal or by revision or any other legally permissible mode. No litigant can be allowed to seek information as to why and for what reasons the judge had come to a particular decision or conclusion. A judge is not bound to explain later on for what reasons he had come to such a conclusion.

(Para-6)

 A judicial officer is entitled to get protection and the object of the same is not to protect malicious or corrupt judges, but to protect the public from the dangers to which the administration of justice would be exposed if the concerned judicial officers were subject to inquiry as to malice, or to litigation with those whom their decisions might offend. If anything is done contrary to this, it would certainly affect the independence of the judiciary. A judge should be free to make independent decisions.

(Para-7)

  

SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

K.G. Balakrishnan, C.J. & B.S. Chauhan, J.

Special Leave Petition (Civil) No. 34868 of 2009

Decided on : 04.01.2010

Khanapuram Gandaiah ... Appellants     Vs.         Administrative Officer and Ors. ...Respondent

 ORDER

 1. This special leave petition has been filed against the judgment and order dated 24.4.2009 passed in Writ Petition No. 28810 of 2008 by the High Court of Andhra Pradesh by which the writ petition against the order of dismissal of the petitioner’s application and successive appeals under the Right to Information Act, 2005 (hereinafter called the “RTI Act”) has been dismissed. In the said petition, the direction was sought by the Petitioner to the Respondent No. 1 to provide information as asked by him vide his application dated 15.11.2006 from the Respondent No. 4 – a Judicial Officer as for what reasons, the Respondent No. 4 had decided his Miscellaneous Appeal dishonestly.

2. The facts and circumstances giving rise to this case are, that the petitioner claimed to be in exclusive possession of the land in respect of which civil suit No. 854 of 2002 was filed before Additional Civil Judge, Ranga Reddy District praying for perpetual injunction by Dr. Mallikarjina Rao against the petitioner and another, from entering into the suit land. Application filed for interim relief in the said suit stood dismissed. Being aggrieved, the plaintiff therein preferred CMA No. 185 of 2002 and the same was also dismissed. Two other suits were filed in respect of the same property impleading the Petitioner also as the defendant. In one of the suits i.e. O.S. No. 875 of 2003, the Trial Court granted temporary injunction against the Petitioner. Being aggrieved, Petitioner preferred the CMA No. 67 of 2005, which was dismissed by the Appellate Court – Respondent No. 4 vide order dated 10.8.2006.

3. Petitioner filed an application dated 15.11.2006 under Section 6 of the RTI Act before the Administrative Officer-cum- Assistant State Public Information Officer (respondent No. 1) seeking information to the queries mentioned therein. The said application was rejected vide order dated 23.11.2006 and an appeal against the said order was also dismissed vide order dated 20.1.2007. Second Appeal against the said order was also dismissed by the Andhra Pradesh State Information Commission vide order dated 20.11.2007. The petitioner challenged the said order before the High Court, seeking a direction to the Respondent No. 1 to furnish the information as under what circumstances the Respondent No. 4 had passed the Judicial Order dismissing the appeal against the interim relief granted by the Trial Court. The Respondent No. 4 had been impleaded as respondent by name. The Writ Petition had been dismissed by the High Court on the grounds that the information sought by the petitioner cannot be asked for under the RTI Act. Thus, the application was not maintainable. More so, the judicial officers are protected by the Judicial Officers’ Protection Act, 1850 (hereinafter called the “Act 1850”). Hence, this petition.

4. Mr. V. Kanagaraj, learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioner has submitted that right to information is a fundamental right of every citizen. The RTI Act does not provide for any special protection to the Judges, thus petitioner has a right to know the reasons as to how the Respondent No. 4 has decided his appeal in a particular manner. Therefore, the application filed by the petitioner was maintainable. Rejection of the application by the Respondent No. 1 and Appellate authorities rendered the petitioner remediless. Petitioner vide application dated 15.11.2006 had asked as under what circumstances the Respondent No. 4 ignored the written arguments and additional written arguments, as the ignorance of the same tantamount to judicial dishonesty, the Respondent No. 4 omitted to examine the fabricated documents filed by the plaintiff; and for what reason the respondent No. 4 omitted to examine the documents filed by the petitioner. Similar information had been sought on other points.

5. At the outset, it must be noted that the petitioner has not challenged the order passed by the Respondent No. 4. Instead, he had filed the application under Section 6 of the RTI Act to know why and for what reasons Respondent No. 4 had come to a particular conclusion which was against the petitioner. The nature of the questions posed in the application was to the effect why and for what reason Respondent No. 4 omitted to examine certain documents and why he came to such a conclusion. Altogether, the petitioner had sought answers for about ten questions raised in his application and most of the questions were to the effect as to why Respondent No. 4 had ignored certain documents and why he had not taken note of certain arguments advanced by the petitioner’s counsel.

6. Under the RTI Act “information” is defined under Section 2(f) which provides:

information” means any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, report, papers, samples, models, data material held in any electronic form and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other law for the time being in force.

 This definition shows that an applicant under Section 6 of the RTI Act can get any information which is already in existence and accessible to the public authority under law. Of course, under the RTI Act an applicant is entitled to get copy of the opinions, advices, circulars, orders, etc., but he cannot ask for any information as to why such opinions, advices, circulars, orders, etc. have been passed, especially in matters pertaining to judicial decisions. A judge speaks through his judgments or orders passed by him. If any party feels aggrieved by the order/judgment passed by a judge, the remedy available to such a party is either to challenge the same by way of appeal or by revision or any other legally permissible mode. No litigant can be allowed to seek information as to why and for what reasons the judge had come to a particular decision or conclusion. A judge is not bound to explain later on for what reasons he had come to such a conclusion.

7. Moreover, in the instant case, the petitioner submitted his application under Section 6 of the RTI Act before the Administrative Officer-cum- Assistant State Public Information Officer seeking information in respect of the questions raised in his application. However, the Public Information Officer is not supposed to have any material which is not before him; or any information he could have obtained under law. Under Section 6 of the RTI Act, an applicant is entitled to get only such information which can be accessed by the “public authority” under any other law for the time being in force. The answers sought by the petitioner in the application could not have been with the public authority nor could he have had access to this information and Respondent No. 4 was not obliged to give any reasons as to why he had taken such a decision in the matter which was before him. A judge cannot be expected to give reasons other than those that have been enumerated in the judgment or order. The application filed by the petitioner before the public authority is per se illegal and unwarranted. A judicial officer is entitled to get protection and the object of the same is not to protect malicious or corrupt judges, but to protect the public from the dangers to which the administration of justice would be exposed if the concerned judicial officers were subject to inquiry as to malice, or to litigation

with those whom their decisions might offend. If anything is done contrary to this, it would  certainly affect the independence of the judiciary. A judge should be free to make independent decisions.

8. As the petitioner has misused the provisions of the RTI Act, the High Court had rightly dismissed the writ petition.

9. In view of the above, the Special Leave Petition is dismissed accordingly.

Section 306—Abetment of suicide—Suicide—Section 107—- Meaning of Abetment of a thing

A. Indian Penal Code, 1860—Section 306—Abetment of suicide—Suicide—Meaning of The word suicide in itself is nowhere defined in the Indian Penal Code, however its meaning and import is well known and requires no explanation. ‘Sui’ means ‘self’ and ‘cide’ means ‘killing’, thus implying an act of self-killing. In short a person committing suicide must commit it by himself, irrespective of the means employed by him in achieving his object of killing himself.  (Para7)

 B. Indian Penal Code, 1860—Section 309—While suicide in itself is not an offence, considering that the successful offender is beyond the reach of law, attempt to suicide is an offence (Para-10)

 C. Indian Penal Code, 1860—Section 306—Abetment involves a mental process of instigating a person or intentionally aiding a person in doing of a thing—Without a positive act on the part of the accused to instigate or aid in committing suicide, conviction cannot be sustained (Paras 20 and 21)

 SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

Dalveer Bhandari & A. K. Patnaik, JJ.

Criminal Appeal No. 1301 of 2002 Decided on : 05.01.2010

Gangula Mohan Reddy ….Appellants         Vs.      State of Andhra Pradesh ……Respondent

Case-laws relied on

1. Mahendra Singh & Another v. State of M.P. 1995 Supp. (3) SCC 731

2. Ramesh Kumar v. State of Chhattisgarh (2001) 9 SCC 618

3. State of West Bengal v. Orilal Jaiswal & Another. (1994) 1 SCC 73

4. Chitresh Kumar Chopra v. State (Govt. of NCT of Delhi) 2009 (11) SCALE 24

 JUDGMENT: Dalveer Bhandari, J. —

 1.      This appeal is directed against the judgment of the High Court of Judicature of Andhra Pradesh at Hyderabad in Criminal Appeal No. 1039 of 1996 dated 30.3.2002. The appellant was convicted by the Assistant Sessions Judge, Nagarkurnool under Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code (for short ‘the Code’) and sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for 10 years and to pay a fine of Rs. 10,000/- and in default to suffer simple imprisonment for six months.

2.       The appellant, aggrieved by the said judgment of the learned Assistant Sessions Judge filed an appeal before the High Court. The High Court upheld the judgment of the learned Assistant Sessions Judge, but while affirming the conviction of the appellant under Section 306 of the Code, the sentence of rigorous imprisonment of 10 years was reduced to 5 years. The appellant, aggrieved by the said judgment, approached this Court. This Court granted leave and released the appellant on bail.

3.       The brief facts which are relevant to dispose of this appeal are recapitulated as under:

 According to the case of the prosecution, the appellant, who is an agriculturist had harassed his agriculture labour (servant) deceased Ramulu by levelling the allegation that he had committed theft of some gold ornaments two days prior to his death. It was also alleged that the appellant had demanded Rs. 7,000/- from the deceased which was given in advance to him at the time when he was kept in employment.

4.       The prosecution further alleged that the deceased Ramulu could not bear the harassment meted out to him and he committed suicide by consuming pesticides. The prosecution in support of its case examined the father of the deceased as P.W.1 Urikonda Jammanna in which he had stated that his son Ramulu was a farm servant and used to work at the house of the appellant. He also stated that the appellant gave Rs. 7,000/- in advance to his son. PW1 also stated that about two years ago, the appellant had asked his son (Ramulu) that his wrist watch was missing from his house and harassed him on which his son had returned the watch to the appellant. PW1 in his statement stated that the appellant also levelled the allegation that the gold ear-rings were also missing from his house and the same were stolen by Ramulu. PW1 also stated that the appellant also demanded the advance of Rs. 7,000/- paid to Ramulu at the time of his employment. He further stated that Ramulu committed suicide because the appellant had levelled the allegation of theft of ornaments.

5.       The prosecution also examined Balamma, the mother of the deceased as P.W.2. She also corroborated the statement of PW1 and gave same version of the incident in her testimony. On the basis of the testimonies of P.W.1 and P.W.2, the Trial Court convicted the appellant under Section 306 of the Code and his conviction on appeal was confirmed by the High Court.

6.      Learned Counsel for the appellant submitted that the conviction of the appellant is totally unsustainable because no ingredients of offence under Section 306 of the Code can be made out in the facts and circumstances of this case. It would be profitable to set out Section 306 of the Code:

“306. Abetment of suicide – If any person commits suicide, whoever abets the commission of such suicide, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extent to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.”

7.      The word suicide in itself is nowhere defined in the Indian Penal Code, however its meaning and import is well known and requires no explanation. ‘Sui’ means ‘self’ and ‘cide’ means ‘killing’, thus implying an act of self-killing. In short a person committing suicide must commit it by himself, irrespective of the means employed by him in achieving his object of killing himself.

8.      Suicide by itself is not an offence under either English or Indian criminal law, though at one time it was a felony in England. In England, the former law was of the nature of being a deterrent to people as it provided penalties of two types:

 • Degradation of corpse of deceased by burying it on the highway with a stake through its chest.

• Forfeiture of property of deceased by the State.

9.      This penalty was later distilled down to merely not providing a full Christian burial, unless the deceased could be proved to be of unsound mind. However, currently there is no punishment for suicide after the enactment of the Suicide Act, 1961 which proclaims that the rule of law whereby it was a crime for a person to commit suicide has been abrogated.

10.   In our country, while suicide in itself is not an offence, considering that the successful offender is beyond the reach of law, attempt to suicide is an offence under Section 309 of IPC.

11.   ‘Abetment’ has been defined under Section 107 of the Code. We deem it appropriate to reproduce Section 107, which reads as under:

 107. Abetment of a thing – A person abets the doing of a thing, who –

 First – Instigates any person to do that thing; or

Secondly – Engages with one or more other person or persons in any conspiracy for the doing of that thing, if an act or illegal omission takes places in pursuance of that conspiracy, and in order to the doing of that thing; or

Thirdly – Intentionally aides, by any act or illegal omission, the doing of that thing.

 12.   Explanation 2 which has been inserted along with Section 107 reads as under:

 Explanation 2 – Whoever, either prior to or at the time of the commission of an act, does anything in order to facilitate the commission of that act, and thereby facilitate the commission thereof, is said to aid the doing of that act.

 13.  Learned Counsel for the appellant has placed reliance on a judgment of this Court in Mahendra Singh and Anr. v.State of M.P. 1995 Supp. (3) SCC 731. In the case of Mahendra Singh, the allegations levelled are as under:

 My mother-in-law and husband and sister-in-law (husband’s elder brother’s wife) harassed me. They beat me and abused me. My husband Mahendra wants to marry a second time. He has illicit connections with my sister-in-law. Because of these reasons and being harassed I want to die by burning.

14.  The court on aforementioned allegations came to a definite conclusion that by no stretch the ingredients of abetment are attracted on the statement of the deceased. According to the appellant, the conviction of the appellant under Section 306 IPC merely on the basis of aforementioned allegation of harassment of the deceased is unsustainable in law.

15.   Learned Counsel also placed reliance on another judgment of this Court inRamesh Kumar v. State of Chhattisgarh (2001) 9 SCC 618. A three-Judge bench of this Court had an occasion to deal with a case of a similar nature. In a dispute between the husband and wife, the appellant husband uttered “you are free to do whatever you wish and go wherever you like”. Thereafter, the wife of the appellant Ramesh Kumar committed suicide. The Court in paragraph 20 has examined different shades of the meaning of “instigation’. Para 20 reads as under:

“20. Instigation is to goad, urge forward, provoke, incite or encourage to do “an act”. To satisfy the requirement of instigation though it is not necessary that actual words must be used to that effect. or what constitutes instigation must necessarily and specifically be suggestive of the consequence. Yet a reasonable certainty to incite the consequence must be capable of being spelt out. the present one is not a case where the accused had by his acts or omission or by a continued course of conduct created such circumstances that the deceased was left with no other option except to commit suicide in which case an instigation may have been inferred. A word uttered in the fit of anger or emotion without intending the consequences to actually follow cannot be said to be instigation.”

 16.   In State of West Bengal v. Orilal Jaiswal and Anr. (1994) 1 SCC 73, this Court has cautioned that the Court should be extremely careful in assessing the facts and circumstances of each case and the evidence adduced in the trail for the purpose of finding whether the cruelty meted out to the victim had in fact induced her to end the life by committing suicide. If it appears to the Court that a victim committing suicide was hypersensitive to ordinary petulance, discord and difference in domestic life quite common to the society to which the victim belonged and such petulance, discord and difference were not expected to induce a similarly circumstanced individual in a given society to commit suicide, the conscience of the Court should not be satisfied for basing a finding that the accused charged of abetting the offence of suicide should be found guilty.

17.  The Court in the instant case came to the conclusion that there is no evidence and material available on record wherefrom an inference of the accused-appellant having abetted commission of suicide by Seema may necessarily be drawn.

18.  In the instant case, the deceased was undoubtedly hyper sensitive to ordinary petulance, discord and differences which happen in our day-to-day life. Human sensitivity of each individual differs from the other. Different people behave differently in the same situation.

19.   This Court in Chitresh Kumar Chopra v. State (Govt. of NCT of Delhi) 2009 (11) SCALE 24 had an occasion to deal with this aspect of abetment. The court dealt with the dictionary meaning of the word “instigation” and “goading”. The court opined that there should be intention to provoke, incite or encourage the doing of an act by the latter. Each person’s suicidability pattern is different from the others. Each person has his own idea of self esteem and self respect. Therefore, it is impossible to lay down any straight-jacket formula in dealing with such cases. Each case has to be decided on the basis of its own facts and circumstances.

20.  Abetment involves a mental process of instigating a person or intentionally aiding a person in doing of a thing. Without a positive act on the part of the accused to instigate or aid in committing suicide, conviction cannot be sustained.

21.  The intention of the Legislature and the ratio of the cases decided by this Court is clear that in order to convict a person under Section 306 IPC there has to be a clear mens rea to commit the offence. It also requires an active act or direct act which led the deceased to commit suicide seeing no option and this act must have been intended to push the deceased into such a position that he committed suicide.

22.   In the light of the provisions of law and the settled legal positions crystallized by a series of judgments of this Court, the conviction of the appellant cannot be sustained. Consequently, the appeal filed by the appellant is allowed and disposed of.

23.  During the pendency of the appeal, the appellant was released on bail. He is not required to surrender. His bail bond is cancelled and he is set at liberty forthwith, if not required in any other case.

24.  Consequently, the appeal filed by the appellant is allowed.