Supreme Court Dismisses Plea Seeking Details Of Judges' Appointment Meet
The apex Court on December 12, 2022, dismissed a plea regarding the disclosure of details of a Collegium meeting that was held on December 12, 2018, under the Right To Information (RTI) Act. The petitioner appealed to know the details of a meeting where certain decisions were allegedly taken for the promotion of some judges to the Supreme Court.
A bench of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar claimed that only resolutions written and signed by all Collegium members can be considered to be a final decision. It also added that tentative resolutions drawn upon discussion and consultation among the members cannot be considered as a final decision unless they were signed by all of them
"Whatever is discussed shall not be in public domain. Only final decision required to be uploaded," the top court added.
The top court was listening to a petition by RTI activist Anjali Bhardwaj against the Delhi High Court order which dismissed her plea seeking the agenda of the Supreme Court Collegium's meeting held on December 12,2018
Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for Bhardwaj, claimed that former Supreme court judge Justice MB Lokur, who was part of the SC Collegium in 2018, had said in public domain that the decisions made at the Collegium meeting on December 12, 2018 should have been uploaded on the top court's website.
On December 12, 2018, the Collegium headed by the then Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi along with Justices Lokur, AK Sikri, SA Bobde and NV Ramana (all retired now) had purportedly taken certain decisions with regard to appointment of judges in the top court and proposals for transfer of chief justices and judges of high courts, however, those resolutions were not uploaded on the court's web site.
Later, on January 10, 2019, the Collegium, whose combination then changed due to the retirement of a few judges, took another big decision of recommending to the Centre the elevation of Justices Dinesh Maheshwari and Sanjiv Khanna and said that the recommendations should be dated December 12, 2018, as the proposal for the recommendation was made then however, could not be finalized as it was decided to have a fresh look at proposal.
On the same day the Collegium decided to reconsider the earlier proposals in the light of additional material that became available.
Bhushan, who narrated the sequence of the events, told the bench that the petitioner is only seeking to know the three specific documents related to the Collegium meeting of December 12, 2018.
"The question here is whether the decision of the Collegium comes under the purview of the Right to Information Act. The subsequent meeting dated January 10, 2019 mentions about the decision taken on December 12, 2018," he said.
