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Synopsis

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has approached the Gujarat High Court seeking review of the judgement which had set aside a 2016 order by the Central Information Commission to the Gujarat University to disclose the degree of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

High Court has issued the rule and put up the matter for consideration on June 30.

Kejriwal has asked the High Court to reconsider the judgement of March 31, 2023, "which suffers from error apparent on the face of record" in the interest of justice. He has also sought stay of the judgement.

In his plea, Kejriwal has contended that during the hearing before the court, the University first time contended that the graduation degree was available on the website. "But upon a search of the official website of the Gujarat University, no such degree appears," the review petition said.

The statement of the varsity that the degree was on the website which led the court to observe that the degree was available on the website, is not correct and is an error apparent on the face of the record, the plea stated.

It is further claimed that the High Court wrongly perceived that the applicant persisted with the matter in seeking information and hence cost of Rs 25,000 was imposed. It said it is apparent that he did not file any application for information but only wrote a letter on April 28, 2016, which was in response to a letter to the CIC.

"It is born out from the record itself that the applicant never requested the CIC to treat him as an applicant for the purposes of the said information. The proceedings were taken up Suo Motu by CIC, which itself clearly shows that Applicant never insisted or persisted with the matter," it said.

In its judgement, the Gujarat High Court had set aside the order passed by the CIC in "a fishing and roving inquiry" at the oral request of Kejriwal for "extraneous considerations".

Justice Biren Vaishnav has also imposed Rs 25,000 cost on Kejriwal for he "doubtlessly used an appeal against him to kick start and trigger a controversy not falling within the purview of the RTI Act for the objects and purpose this court need not go into". 

The court had said Kejriwal persisted with the matter before it despite the degree in question being put on the website of the petitioner University for all to see.

High Court had further held that there had 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".