The Intelligence Bureau and Section 24: what RTI can still reach — the verified law

Section 24(1) of the Right to Information Act, 2005 provides that nothing in the Act applies to the intelligence and security organisations specified in the Second Schedule, or to information furnished by those organisations to the Central Government. The Intelligence Bureau heads that Schedule; the Central Government can add or remove organisations by notification under Section 24(2), and the CBI is also in the Schedule today (its inclusion was the very ground of the 2024 Delhi High Court case below).

The exclusion then turns on two provisos (read Section 24 on Indian Kanoon):

• First proviso — “the information pertaining to the allegations of corruption and human rights violations shall not be excluded under this sub-section”.
• Second proviso — where the information sought is about allegations of violation of human rights, it “shall only be provided after the approval of the Central Information Commission”, and the time limit is forty-five days from receipt of the request instead of the usual thirty.

So the practical question in every IB (or other Second Schedule) case is not “does RTI apply?” — it is “does the information sought pertain to allegations of corruption or human rights violations?”

In Union of India v. Adarsh Sharma, the applicant wanted travel details of a doctor — date of departure from India, destination, flight and passport number — information lying with the IB's immigration set-up. The CIC ordered disclosure; the Delhi High Court quashed that order. Since the information “was neither any information related to the allegations of corruption in Intelligence Bureau nor an information related to the human rights violations”, the proviso did not apply and the IB could not be compelled.

The court did add a humane note: even where RTI does not apply, the agency “would be well-advised in assisting a citizen, by providing such an information, despite the fact that it cannot be accessed as a matter of right” — and it asked the IB to consider the request administratively. Useful language to quote when you write to an exempt organisation outside the proviso.

Sanjiv Chaturvedi, an Indian Forest Service officer known for exposing irregularities, sought a copy of an IB report concerning him. The IB argued the proviso only covers corruption within the IB itself. The Delhi High Court rejected that reading:

The IB report was held to be “information” under Section 2(f), it pertained to allegations of corruption, and a certified copy was ordered to be given.

The same officer won the same point against the CBI. In CPIO, CBI v. Sanjeev Chaturvedi (30 January 2024), the CBI argued its Second Schedule entry was a complete bar. The Delhi High Court dismissed the writ petition and upheld the CIC's order: records relating to his corruption complaint about procurement irregularities at AIIMS had to be disclosed, because information pertaining to corruption allegations “shall not be excluded” no matter which Schedule the organisation sits in.

The proviso's second limb is human rights. In Ehtesham Qutubuddin Siddique v. CPIO, Intelligence Bureau, a convict in the 7/11 Mumbai train blasts case sought an IB report he said would show he was falsely implicated. The Delhi High Court held “there can be little doubt that the petitioner's application seeking review report does pertain to an allegation of human rights violation”, set aside the CIC's rejection, and sent the matter back for a decision under the proviso — the CIC being the statutory gatekeeper for human-rights disclosures.

The Central Information Commission itself applies the gateway. In Vinod Kumar Bindal v. CBI (October 2025), a person whose name appeared in the CBI's published “Undesirable Contact Men” list — without notice to him — asked how the list was prepared. The CIC held the publication affected his reputation, dignity and professional standing, engaged the human-rights proviso, and directed the CBI to answer.

Remember the mechanics for this limb: CIC approval is mandatory and the clock is 45 days, not 30.

This is the claim the fabricated ruling made, so here is the honest, verified position:

• No Supreme Court or High Court decision we could verify gives employees of Second Schedule organisations a general RTI right to their own personnel records. Section 24 excludes the organisation as a whole; it does not carve out “own records”.
• The proviso is the only RTI route. If your grievance genuinely pertains to allegations of corruption or of human rights violation — and information commissions test this on the facts, case by case — the proviso can open the door, as the cases above show. A routine request for copies of one's service book, framed with no corruption or human-rights allegation, sits on the Adarsh Sharma side of the line.
• Service law remains fully available. Exclusion from RTI does not touch your rights under the service and pension rules that govern you, departmental representation channels, or the Central Administrative Tribunal and the courts. For how the ordinary (non-exempt) service-records law works — your APAR, service book and Section 8(1)(j) — see Your own APAR and service book under RTI.
• Voluntary assistance can be asked for. Adarsh Sharma expressly encourages exempt agencies to assist citizens administratively even where RTI does not compel them.

• You cannot get, as of right: operational, intelligence, administrative or routine records of the IB or other listed organisations — however harmless the record looks — unless your request fits the proviso (Adarsh Sharma).
• You can get: information pertaining to allegations of corruption, on the ordinary 30-day clock (Chaturvedi 2017; CBI v. Chaturvedi 2024).
• You can get, with CIC approval, in 45 days: information pertaining to allegations of human rights violations (Siddique 2019; Bindal 2025).
• You can always ask the organisation to assist voluntarily, quoting the Adarsh Sharma observation — but a refusal of such a request is not appealable under RTI.

For the full list of exempt organisations and how PIOs handle transferred requests, see Section 24: exempt intelligence and security organisations and the annotated Section 24 text.

If your matter genuinely involves corruption or human-rights allegations, say so explicitly and connect the records you want to those allegations. Do not bury the allegation — the proviso is your only jurisdiction hook. A skeleton:

Under Section 6(1) of the RTI Act, 2005, I request the following
information. Although [organisation] is listed in the Second
Schedule, this request pertains to allegations of [corruption /
violation of human rights], and is therefore not excluded, as per
the proviso to Section 24(1) and CPIO, Intelligence Bureau v.
Sanjiv Chaturvedi, W.P.(C) 5521/2016, Delhi High Court,
23.08.2017.

The allegations, in brief: [two or three factual sentences].

Records sought:
1. [Specific record connected to the allegation]
2. [Specific record connected to the allegation]

If this is treated as a human-rights matter, I note that under the
second proviso to Section 24(1) the information is to be provided
within 45 days with the approval of the Central Information
Commission. If any part is withheld, please cite the exact
provision and inform me of my right to appeal under Section 19.

You can generate a clean application with the RTI Drafter, test a refusal with the PIO Reply Checker, and build the appeal with the First Appeal Builder. Fees vary by state — see state-wise RTI fees.

Almost — Section 24(1) excludes it — but not absolutely. Information pertaining to allegations of corruption and human rights violations is expressly not excluded, and the Delhi High Court has ordered disclosure against the IB on exactly that basis (Chaturvedi, 2017; Siddique, 2019).

No. The Delhi High Court in Chaturvedi (2017) rejected that narrow reading: the proviso applies to information pertaining to corruption or human-rights allegations “irrespective of the fact that the information pertains to the exempt intelligence and security organisations or not”.

Because the second proviso to Section 24(1) requires the Central Information Commission's approval before human-rights-related information is released, and substitutes a 45-day limit for Section 7's usual 30 days.

Not as a matter of course — we could verify no judgment creating such a right, and an earlier version of this page that claimed a 2018 Supreme Court ruling to that effect has been corrected. The employee's remedies lie in the service and pension rules and the tribunals; RTI helps only if the request genuinely pertains to corruption or human-rights allegations under the proviso.

Yes, the CBI is in the Second Schedule — but the same proviso applies. In CPIO, CBI v. Sanjeev Chaturvedi (Delhi HC, 30 January 2024) the CBI was ordered to disclose records of a corruption complaint despite its exemption, and in Vinod Kumar Bindal (CIC, 2025) it was directed to explain its “Undesirable Contact Men” listing on human-rights grounds.

• Section 24, The Right to Information Act, 2005 — indiankanoon.org/doc/1767825
• Union of India v. Adarsh Sharma, W.P.(C) 7453/2011, Delhi HC, 9 October 2013 — indiankanoon.org/doc/92208095
• CPIO, Intelligence Bureau v. Sanjiv Chaturvedi, W.P.(C) 5521/2016, Delhi HC, 23 August 2017 — indiankanoon.org/doc/73434696
• Ehtesham Qutubuddin Siddique v. CPIO, Intelligence Bureau, W.P.(C) 9773/2018, Delhi HC, 16 January 2019 — indiankanoon.org/doc/82628968
• CPIO, CBI v. Sanjeev Chaturvedi, W.P.(C) 2833/2020, Delhi HC, 30 January 2024 — indiankanoon.org/doc/116341122
• Vinod Kumar Bindal v. CBI, CIC/MPERS/A/2017/107414-ADJUNCT, CIC, October 2025 — indiankanoon.org/doc/125651866

These rulings have the closest editorial ratio to this topic — useful starting points if you are researching the same point of law.

• Defence pension sanction records — CIC (CIC 2020)
• Own APAR and service-book access (SC 2022)
• Armed-forces service records — Delhi HC (HC-DEL 2017)
• Public servant's own service record — SC (SC 2015)
• Pension records — Kerala HC (HC-KER 2018)

• Section 24: exempt intelligence and security organisations — PIO guide
• Section 24 — annotated text
• All RTI cases turning on §24
• All RTI cases turning on §8
• Full case-law search
• Case-Law Database — overview
• PIO RTI Reply Guide
• The RTI Act, 2005 — annotated

Editorial summary · reviewed by Dr. Shrawan Kumar Pathak · last reviewed 10 July 2026.