PM Modi's PG degree already public, says Gujarat High Court; fines Arvind Kejriwal

The Gujarat High Court on Friday set aside an order of the Central Information Commission (CIC), asking the Gujarat University to provide information on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's post graduation degree to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal under the Right to Information Act.

Justice Biren Vaishnav also imposed a fine of ₹25,000 on Kejriwal and asked him to deposit the amount to the Gujarat State Legal Services Authority within four weeks.

The GU had challenged a CIC order asking the PIO to the Prime Minister's Office to provide details. The University had put out the degree on its website in 2016 while challenging the CIC in principle as University has several degrees in a fiduciary capacity and is not governed by RTI Act. The court on Friday ruled in GU's favour.


The court observed, "There has been an indiscriminate misuse of the salutary provisions of the RTI Act in the present case for the purposes not contemplated by the legislature while enacting the said Act. In the present case, the manner in which a request came from Respondent No.2 (Kejriwal) who was neither an Applicant nor an appellant and was merely a respondent before the CIC leaves much to be desired. Such requests cannot be made so casually making mockery of the very intent and purpose of the RTI Act."

"Further despite the degree in question being put on the website of the petitioner University for all to see and despite this fact being made expressly clear with precision in the pleadings before this court and despite the respondent never ever disputing the degree in question either during the pendency of these proceedings or even during final hearing, the Respondent no 2 has persisted with the matter. This is one more reason to impose costs while allowing this petition," stated the order.