HYDERABAD: In what could turn out to be a major cause of embarrassment to enforcers of the RTI Act, the Andhra Pradesh Public Service Commission in a letter dated October 19, rejected a directive from the Andhra Pradesh Information Commission to furnish answer sheets of a test conducted in 2008 as requested by an individual under grounds the request is not feasible for compliance.The APPSC’s letter is in direct defiance of Section 19 (7) and (8) of RTI Act 2005, which clearly states “the decision of the Central or State Information Commission, as the case may be, shall be binding.”Chief information commissioner Jannat Hussain expressed disappointment over the development."A recent Supreme Court ruling directed a person can view his/her answer answer sheets of any exam, since they are objects in public domain. The directive issued by the APIC is based on this ruling and final. If the decision was felt as wrong by the APPSC, they should have filed a petition against the directive with the HC or SC and not replied through a letter," he said.The individual who filed the complaint against the APPSC is Sri Kadiyan Sekhar Babu from the Guntur district. He filed an RTI application on September 2, 2009 requesting certified copies of answer sheets relating to Group-I main exam held in August 2008. With no reply in sight, he filed his first appeal a month later, to which the APPSC responded the information required could not be furnished. Babu filed his second appeal with the APIC in March 2010, referring to the successful appeal of a similar RTI request by one Dr L Srinivas versus the NTR Health University earlier that year.After a thorough perusal of documents submitted, the APIC with regards to a Supreme Court ruling on August 9, 2011 (which demerits the claims of examining bodies to right of confidentiality and fiduciary over answer books), directed the APPSC to furnish the required information as sought by Babu, free of cost, within 30 days in an order dated August 19.
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