Section 9 — Grounds for Rejection to Access

“Where a request for information relates to a matter which, in the opinion of the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, involves infringement of copyright subsisting in a person other than the State, such Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer, as the case may be, may reject the request for information.”

Three things follow from the words themselves:

• “may reject” — it is a discretion, not a duty. Even where third-party copyright genuinely subsists, the PIO can still disclose (and often should, with attribution and a copy-purpose condition).
• “subsisting in a person other than the State” — the State's own copyright is carved out on purpose. Anything authored by the public authority — its reports, tender documents, notifications, court-ordered disclosures — is outside Section 9.
• “involves infringement” — the PIO must show how disclosure would actually infringe, not merely that a copyright exists somewhere. Mere ownership is not the test.

• Licensed software held by a department (vendor's copyright).
• Published works supplied to government — books, journals, maps, standards bought from or licensed by third parties.
• Consultant-authored material — a private firm's report commissioned by government, where copyright stayed with the firm.
• Exam and answer material of professional bodies, where the copyright vests in the body (see case law below — though the refusal there rested on §8(1)(e), not §9).

And what it does not cover:

• The authority's own circulars, orders, file notings, tenders and reports (State-authored — no third party).
• Public records where copyright has expired or never subsisted.
• Material the authority received from another public authority — that is a §6(3) transfer question, not a copyright question.

Section 8(1)(d) exempts commercial confidence, trade secrets and intellectual property including copyright, without the “other than the State” limit. In practice PIOs cite both together. The applicant's counters, in order: (a) who owns the right — if the State, both limbs fail; (b) is there a larger public interest under the §8(1)(d) proviso; © severability under §10 — the copyrighted annexure does not carry the whole request into the dark.

• ICAI v. Shaunak H. Satya, (2011) 8 SCC 781 (SC, 2 Sept 2011) — a candidate sought examiners' evaluation instructions and model answers from ICAI. The Supreme Court refused disclosure, treating question papers, solutions and instructions as intellectual property in which copyright subsists — but note precisely: the copyright vested in ICAI itself, a public authority, so the refusal rested on §8(1)(e) fiduciary capacity and IP grounds rather than Section 9. The Court, in line with its companion ruling CBSE v. Aditya Bandopadhyay, (2011) 8 SCC 497, observed that furnishing information under the RTI Act would not, by itself, amount to an infringement of copyright subsisting in a person other than the State.
• The working rule from the pair: Section 9 bites only where the copyright sits with a third party; where the public authority owns the material, the fight is on §8(1)(d)/(e), not §9.

Section 2(j)(i) makes inspection of documents part of the right to information. Reading a copyrighted work at the PIO's office is not reproduction and is not infringement. Where a PIO refuses copies under §9, ask for inspection in the alternative — and note in the first appeal that the refusal of even inspection shows the ground is being used as a blanket, not a scalpel.

1. In the application itself, add: //“If any exemption is claimed, please identify the owner of the copyright relied upon and the manner of anticipated infringement.”//
2. On refusal, first appeal: demand the ownership analysis; point out State-authored material is outside §9; claim severance under §10 and inspection under §2(j)(i).
3. Second appeal: a bare §9 label with no third-party identification has repeatedly failed before Information Commissions — present it as a misuse of the narrowest exemption.

• Identify the copyright holder on record before invoking §9 — “probably copyrighted” is not a ground.
• Consider partial disclosure: facts extracted from a consultant's report are not the report; a summary may satisfy the request without reproducing the work.
• Consultation with the third party is a §11 process, not §9; do not stretch §9 to avoid a §11 notice.

Ask who owns it. Plans submitted by a private architect may carry the architect's copyright — but inspection and factual extracts remain open, and §10 severance usually recovers most of what you actually need.

No. A tender authored by the public authority is State material — Section 9's “other than the State” words take it out entirely.

No — the fee is for the service of copying. Section 9 is about the legal risk of reproduction; the answer is attribution, inspection, or severance, not fee logic.

Usually yes where a vendor owns it — but demand the licence terms; governments' contracts often permit disclosure to auditors and citizens for transparency purposes.

For drafting RTIs or appeals engaging this section, use the First RTI template or the First Appeal template. See How to fill an RTI application for structural help.

• Back to the full RTI Act
• Section 8 — Exemptions
• Section 10 — Severability
• Section 19 — Appeals
• All explanations
• Landmark RTI decisions
• The RTI Playbook book

1. Right to Information Act, 2005, Sections 9, 2(j)(i), 6(3), 8(1)(d), 8(1)(e), 10, 11.
2. ICAI v. Shaunak H. Satya, (2011) 8 SCC 781; CBSE v. Aditya Bandopadhyay, (2011) 8 SCC 497.
3. Department of Personnel and Training, Guide on the RTI Act, 2005.

Last reviewed: 27 August 2026. Statutory text checked against the Act; the ICAI v. Shaunak H. Satya citation retained with its precise holding (copyright vested in ICAI itself; refusal on s.8(1)(e)/IP grounds; no s.9 basis), and the un-attributed tender-document CIC note replaced by the section's own “other than the State” limit.