The Bombay High Court has held that a public authority is not under an obligation under the RTI Act to obtain information from a private body to satisfy an applicant seeking information. The Court further held that while the public authority is required to furnish the information held by it at the point in time when the request is made, the RTI Act does not cast an obligation to collect or collate information not available with it and then to furnish the same.

A Division Bench comprising Justice Manish Pitale and Justice Shreeram V. Shirsat was hearing a batch of writ petitions filed by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), challenging orders passed by the Central Information Commission (CIC), vide which the CIC had directed SEBI to obtain information from BSE and provide it to applicants under the RTI Act. The common question before the Court was whether a public authority is obliged to collect or obtain information from a private body and furnish the same to an RTI applicant.

The petitioners submitted that SEBI, as a public authority and regulator, was required to provide information available with it when an RTI application was submitted, subject to the provisions of the Act, including Section 8, but was not required to collect information from third parties such as BSE.

The Court noted that Section 2(f) requires a public authority to furnish information held by it relating to any private body. However, it clarified that though a public authority is required to provide information held by it at the point in time when the request is made, the provisions cannot be stretched to impose an obligation on bodies like SEBI to call upon third parties to provide information.

“The provisions do not indicate that a public authority, like SEBI in the present case, which is a regulatory body empowered to call upon third parties to provide information in terms of its own governing statute, is under an obligation to obtain information from third parties to satisfy persons applying for such information,” the Court remarked.

The Court referred to the Supreme Court's decision in CBSE v. Aditya Bandopadhyay, and noted that the Supreme Court clearly laid down the position that the RTI Act does not place an obligation upon a public authority like SEBI to collect or collate information not available with it and then to furnish the same to the applicants.

The Court further noted that the CIC itself had subsequently passed orders declining to direct public authorities such as SEBI to obtain information from third parties such as BSE.

“… the CIC itself, in various orders brought to our notice after the Supreme Court clarified the said position of law… and declined to issue any direction to the public authorities like SEBI, to obtain information from third parties like BSE, to provide information to the applicants under the provisions of the RTI Act,” the Court observed.

Hence, while allowing the petitions, the Court held that the reasoning adopted by the CIC in the impugned orders could not be sustained. The orders passed by the CIC were accordingly quashed.

Case Title: Securities and Exchange Board of India v. Yogesh Babulal Mehta [Writ Petition No. 1664 of 2009 & connected matters]

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