SC rejects RTI plea seeking report on Justice Yashwant Varma inquiry, cites fiduciary limits and privacy

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has rejected an application filed under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005, seeking access to the in-house inquiry committee report concerning allegations against Justice Yashwant Varma, Live Law reported. The court also declined to disclose a letter written by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) to the President and the Prime Minister forwarding the said report.The application, submitted on May 9 by Amritpal Singh Khalsa, was turned down by the Supreme Court's Central Public Information Officer (CPIO), citing key legal exemptions. In a reply dated May 21, the CPIO referred to the Supreme Court's 2019 judgment in CPIO, Supreme Court of India vs Subhash Chandra Agarwal and Sections 8(1)(e) and 11(1) of the RTI Act.Section 8(1)(e) exempts information held in a fiduciary capacity unless a larger public interest is established, while Section 11 protects third-party information from disclosure. “The information cannot be provided… with reference to independence of judiciary, proportionality test, fiduciary relationship, invasion of the right to privacy and breach of duty of confidentiality,” the Additional Registrar and CPIO stated in the reply, reported Live Law.The in-house inquiry was initiated after a large sum of cash was accidentally discovered in a store-room attached to Justice Varma’s official residence during a firefighting operation. At the time, he was serving as a judge of the Delhi High Court. In response, then CJI Sanjiv Khanna constituted a three-member committee on March 22 comprising Justice Sheel Nagu (CJ, Punjab & Haryana HC), Justice GS Sandhawalia (CJ, Himachal Pradesh HC), and Justice Anu Sivaraman (Karnataka HC).On May 8, the CJI forwarded the committee’s report to the President and Prime Minister for further action. Meanwhile, Justice Varma was transferred to the Allahabad High Court—his parent HC—and judicial work was withdrawn from him as per CJI’s directive.Though the preliminary report of the Delhi High Court Chief Justice, Justice Varma's response, and visual documentation from the Delhi Police were uploaded to the Supreme Court website, the final inquiry report remains confidential.