Anjali Bhardwaj v. Union of India — RTI commissions accountability

The 2019 Supreme Court ruling that forced governments to fill Information Commission vacancies on time and to disclose the selection process. Anchored Section 12 of the RTI Act and put a clock on every CIC + State IC appointment.

Anjali Bhardwaj v. Union of India

A long-running petition by RTI activists Anjali Bhardwaj, Lokesh Kumar Batra and Amrita Johri (all of the National Campaign for People's Right to Information / NCPRI) challenged two systemic problems with the Right to Information Act, 2005:

1. Chronic vacancies in the Central Information Commission (CIC) and State Information Commissions (SICs) — keeping seats unfilled meant 30,000+ pending appeals, defeating the §7(1) thirty-day reply right itself.
2. Opaque appointment procedures under §12 — search committees met in secret, criteria were not public, names of applicants were withheld, and only retired bureaucrats were getting through.

The petitioners asked the Supreme Court for time-bound and transparent appointments under §12(3) and §15(3) of the RTI Act, and for parity in pool diversity (not just “ex-civil servants”).

On 15 February 2019, the Supreme Court (Justice AK Sikri writing for the bench with Justice S Abdul Nazeer) issued binding directions under Article 142 of the Constitution. The key holdings:

1. Vacancies to be filled before they arise. The process to fill any expected vacancy must commence at least one to two months in advance of the date the seat falls vacant. Sitting Information Commissioners may not be left without quorum.
2. Search committee composition + criteria must be on the public domain. The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) at the Centre, and corresponding state departments, must publish the names and the qualifying criteria of the search committee that shortlists candidates. The selection committee proceedings must be recorded and the criteria must be publicly available.
3. Names of applicants must be public. When a vacancy is advertised, all applicants' names are to be put on the official website. The shortlist of candidates considered by the search committee must also be public.
4. Pool diversity. The Court observed that overlooking other categories — eminent jurists, journalists, civil-society professionals — runs against §12(5) and §15(5) which expressly contemplate persons of eminence in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media, administration and governance. The selection committee must apply its mind to all these categories.
5. Time-bound disposal. Information Commissions must publish their monthly disposal data to give citizens a yardstick on whether the system is working.

“When the appointment of CICs and ICs is not done in a time-bound manner, those seats fall vacant and that defeats the very purpose of the RTI Act. The Government cannot be allowed to drag its feet in such appointments. The right of information would otherwise become illusory.” — paragraph 38 of the judgment.

“The exercise of selection has to be fair, just and transparent. The criteria for selection have to be made public so that candidates and citizens know on what basis the selection is being made.” — paragraph 41.

The directions remain good law and are routinely cited in RTI litigation across High Courts. The Supreme Court has heard contempt-style follow-up motions where the Centre or state governments delayed appointments — most recently in August 2024 when the Court took strong exception to vacancies in the Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand and Telangana SICs.

The Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (in force from 14 November 2025) does not touch this ruling — the case is about §12 procedure, not §8 exemptions.

• Section 12(3) — Composition of the Central Information Commission, including the selection committee chaired by the Prime Minister.
• Section 12(5) — Eligibility criteria; persons of eminence in eight specified fields.
• Section 13(1) — Term of CIC + ICs (5 years or until 65, whichever is earlier).
• Section 15(3) + §15(5) — Mirror provisions for State Information Commissions.

Anjali Bhardwaj and Others v. Union of India and Others, (2019) 9 SCC 199, Writ Petition (Civil) No 436 of 2018, decided 15 February 2019 by the Supreme Court of India. Bench: A K Sikri and S Abdul Nazeer JJ.

If your state's SIC is sitting on appeals because of vacancies, this case is your weapon. File an RTI under §6(1) to the State Department of Personnel asking for:

1. The dates of every SIC vacancy in the last 24 months and the date the selection process was initiated for each (test the “1-2 months in advance” direction)
2. The names and qualifications of the current search-committee members (test the “publish criteria” direction)
3. The complete list of applicants for the most recent vacancy (test the “names of applicants must be public” direction)
4. The minutes of the most recent search-committee meetings

Use our AI RTI Drafter to auto-build the application, or First Appeal Builder if your RTI is dragging.

1. Supreme Court of India, judgment in Writ Petition (Civil) No 436 of 2018, Anjali Bhardwaj v. Union of India, dated 15 February 2019. Judgment PDF on sci.gov.in.
2. Right to Information Act, 2005, Sections 12, 13, 15. Full text of the RTI Act.
3. NCPRI Annual RTI Assessment 2025 — pendency data across SICs. Satark Nagrik Sangathan (run by the petitioner Anjali Bhardwaj).
4. Follow-up applications and Court orders 2020-2024.

• CPIO Supreme Court v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal — judicial accountability under RTI
• Girish Deshpande — the §8(1)(j) personal-information test
• First Appeal Builder — for §19(1) appeals when SIC sits idle
• RTI case-law database — 300+ CIC + Court decisions
• RTI Act, 2005 — full text

Last reviewed on: 4 May 2026 — RTI Wiki editorial team.