Section 14 — Removal of Information Commissioners

The Information Commissions decide thousands of appeals against the government. If the government of the day could remove a Commissioner at will, the independence that §12's appointment process builds would die at the first inconvenient order. Section 14 is the counterpart protection: the executive appoints, but cannot quietly dismiss. This mirrors the removal protection of judges and statutory adjudicators, and courts read such provisions as structural guarantees of independence.

Route 1 — misbehaviour or incapacity (§14(1)):

1. The **President** refers the question to the **Supreme Court**.
2. The Supreme Court holds an **inquiry** and reports.
3. Removal follows only **on the Supreme Court's holding** — the President acts on the certificate, not before it.
4. Pending the reference, the President may **suspend** the Commissioner (and, where the reference is by the President, direct that the Commissioner be protected in the manner of a Supreme Court judge during the inquiry).

Route 2 — the six direct grounds (§14(2) proviso list): the President may remove without the Supreme Court reference where the Commissioner:

• is adjudged an insolvent;
• engages, while in office, in any paid employment outside the duties of the office;
• is, in the President's opinion, unfit to continue by reason of infirmity of mind or body;
• is of unsound mind and stands so declared by a competent court;
• is convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for an offence which, in the President's opinion, involves moral turpitude;
• engages in political activity.

Note what is not on either list: deciding cases slowly, deciding them against the government, or being publicly criticised. Those are not removal grounds — a Commissioner who is merely inconvenient is safe.

The RTI (Amendment) Act, 2019 rewrote the term and salary provisions (§§13 and 16) — five-year terms and central-government-determined pay replaced the original fixed statutory terms. Section 14 itself was not amended: the removal protection stands as enacted in 2005. Critics of the 2019 amendment argued precisely this contrast — weaker tenure-and-pay security alongside an untouched-but-narrow removal clause — and the Supreme Court in 2019-2021 litigation declined to stay the amendment (see our Anjali Bhardwaj v. UoI entry for the vacancies-and-appointments strand of that litigation).

• A citizen cannot invoke §14. It is a structural safeguard, not a citizen remedy. There is no “application to remove a Commissioner”.
• If a Commissioner's conduct in your case shows bias or conflict of interest, the remedies are: a review/recall application before the Commission, or a writ petition under Article 226 before the High Court (and for the CIC, Article 32).
• Documents about a Commissioner's conduct can still be sought by RTI to the Commission itself — §14 protects tenure, not secrecy.

No completed removal under the misbehaviour/incapacity route in the Act's 20-year history — a measure of how high the bar sits.

Commissioners are appointed to a particular Commission; there is no demotion route around §14 — and transfers do not exist in the Act's scheme.

Campaigning, party office, overt partisan advocacy — not adjudication that a government dislikes.

Yes — §16 mirrors this scheme for State Chief Information Commissioners and State Information Commissioners (removal by the Governor on the corresponding reference to the Supreme Court).

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 13 — Term of office of CIC/IC
• Section 16 — State Commissions
• Section 12 — Constitution of the CIC
• Landmark RTI decisions
• The RTI Playbook book

1. Right to Information Act, 2005, Sections 12, 13, 14, 16.
2. RTI (Amendment) Act, 2019 (terms and salaries; §14 untouched).

Last reviewed: 27 August 2026. Sub-section structure and the six direct grounds checked against the Act's text; truncated H1 and title tag repaired; 2019-amendment interplay restated precisely.