RTI Act and Transparency in CBSE Exam Spending
The Central Information Commission basically told the Central Board of Secondary Education they had to cough up information, point by point, under the RTI Act . It was about exam spending, answer books everything related to the tendering and buying process for those Class 10 and Class 12 exams.
CBSE had already shut it down, but the transparency panel pushed back hard. They insisted the board issue revised answers. They pointed out that whatever they couldn't share could just be masked or redacted under Section 10 of the Act. And if they denied something using Section 8(1)(d), they actually had to give a solid reason for it, not just shrug.
This whole mess started because someone filed an RTI application. They wanted specifics: details on the answer books used in the 2023-24 and 2024-25 sessions. Things like paper quality, page count, size, how much they cost to buy the total spending, GST paid, all the tender stuff for getting those sheets.
CBSE responded, sort of hedging things. They gave some specs: papers ranged from 60 GSM up to 120 GSM. Answer books came in 8, 20, 32, 40 or 48 pages. Sizes were 22 by 28 cm or 37.5 by 54.5 cm. But they shut down the money side. They wouldn't talk about the purchase cost of the books, how many they bought, or the total expenditure.
Then came the tender questions. Names of the companies involved? The rates quoted? Who won the contract? CBSE threw up exemptions "confidential," "sensitive." They pulled in sections like 8(1)(d), 8(1)(e), and 8(1)(g). They basically claimed it was all sensitive board exam business. Plus, they said exam fee money got booked by financial year, not session-by-session. And practical exam costs? That was lumped into a bigger category; they couldn't split it out at all.
The appellant took this denial straight to the CIC. They argued that public interest demanded seeing how the procurement and spending actually happened.
Information Commissioner Sudha Rani Relangi looked at it. The real sticking point, she said, wasn't just the papers. It was denying access to the tender process for buying those answer sheets and related stationery. That felt like a big blow to transparency.
The Commission found something pretty telling there. The CPIO the public information officer had denied everything without giving any actual justification whatsoever. It wasn’t enough. They didn't show up for the hearing. No written statement explaining why they were cutting off the request. Just silence.
So, the CIC made a ruling. "That reply from the CPIO dated March 18th, 2025? Set aside." That was the first punch.
The Commission then looked at the appellant's claim about irregularities in those tenders. They stressed that both the Supreme Court and the CIC have repeatedly hammered home this: exemptions for public procurement absolutely have to be read very strictly. Accountability matters here.
What happened next? The CIC didn’t just stop there. Considering the appellant was talking about actual tender problems, they ordered the CPIO to go back and look at the whole request again. They had to provide revised answers point-wise, categorical replies with whatever information is actually permissible under the RTI Act 2005.
The key instruction was clear: if something is exempt from disclosure, it gets masked or redacted under Section 10. But for those denials based on Sections like 8(1)(d), the CPIO had to justify it using Section 19(5). That’s the mechanism they needed to follow when dealing with commercial secrets or anything that might hurt a third party's standing, unless there was some massive public interest forcing disclosure. It felt like trying to force accountability through paperwork.
Written by Gree News Team — Senior Editorial Board
Gree News Team covers international news and global affairs at Gree News. Our collective of senior editors is dedicated to providing independent, accurate, and responsible journalism for a global audience.
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