The Bombay High Court has held that documents pertaining to the development of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) cannot be kept confidential and would have to be shared with people when public interest is involved.
The ruling was delivered yesterday by a bench, headed by Justice B H Marlapalle, which disposed of a petition filed by SKIL Infra, which has joined hands with development authority CIDCO to set up Navi Mumbai SEZ.
SKIL Infra had challenged RTI Commissioner's order asking CIDCO to provide documents to a Navi Mumbai resident regarding development of Navi Mumbai SEZ Pvt Ltd.
SKIL said its joint venture agreement with CIDCO has a clause that documents pertaining to the project would be kept confidential.
The Court, however, ruled that in a case where public interest is involved such a clause of confidentiality would not be applicable, and documents would have to be made public.
Sanjay Surve, the Navi Mumbai resident, had sought some information from CIDCO on the development of Navi Mumbai SEZ. He asked for 24 documents but was given only 15 and his plea for the remaining was rejected.
Surve appealed to the Managing Director of CIDCO against his organisation's refusal to provide the remaining documents. CIDCO MD gave him one more document and rejected his plea for eight others.
Surve then applied to Information Commissioner of RTI seeking an order to CIDCO to provide the remaining eight documents. The RTI Commissioner asked CIDCO to provide the documents. SKIL challenged this order in High Court.
