A wife does not have the right to enquire about income tax returns filed by her husband, by filing an RTI application, announced The Central Information Commission (CIC). The July 2020 order was recorded during a case where a woman filed an RTI application seeking income tax details of her husband.
The Income Tax department refused to provide the information demanded, and along with it said that the information of income tax return of another person is information exempted under Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act.
Neeraj Kumar Gupta, Information Commissioner stated that filing income tax returns by a person with the Income Tax Department is not a public activity. The Commission also cited,
It comes in the nature of an obligation for a citizen to pay taxes towards his state. Therefore, such information cannot be disclosed to the applicant in the absence of any major public interest.
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The commissioner referred to the ‘Girish Ramchandra Deshpande v. Central Information Commission (2013) 1 SSC 212’, judgment given by the Supreme Court, which stated the details provided by a person in his income tax return is his/her “personal information”. The same is exempted under clause (j) of Section 8 (1) of the RTI Act, unless a larger public interest is involved and the Central Public Information Officer or State Public Information Officer or Appellate Authority is satisfied that it is necessary to disclose such information in the larger public interest.
Another case that was referred by the Commission was ‘Vijay Prakash v. Union of India, AIR 2010 Delhi 7’, judgment given by the Delhi High Court, which read:
In the case of a private dispute between husband and wife, the basic protection afforded by virtue of the exemption from disclosure enacted under Section 8(1)(j) cannot be lifted or disturbed unless the petitioner is able to justify how such disclosure would be in ‘public interest’.
Elaborating on the term “third party” the Commission described the definition by stating,
From the words under Section 2(n) of the RTI Act, 2005, it is clear that any person other than a citizen seeking information will be treated as a ‘third party’”. And hence, XXX fell under the definition of ‘Third-party’ for being another person other than the RTI applicant.
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Adding further, the Commission said,
Apart from this, the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) also considered it confidential and refused to disclose the information. At the same time, it was also told by the CPIO that there is no public interest in this matter. This commission has also not received any public interest in this matter, for which information is required to be made public.
The Commission has said that the appellant has fallen short in demonstrating the information needed for a larger public purpose. And hence, the Commission has asked the Department to provide the appellant with limited information for the last six years.
The woman will be able to present her maintenance case if she would be able to showcase her husband’s ‘gross income’ that is the numerical data.
Click Below To Read Order:
Wife Cannot File RTI To Enquire Husband’s IT Returns In Maintenance Case
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The post Wife Cannot File RTI To Enquire Husband’s Income Tax Returns In Maintenance Case | Read Order appeared first on Mens Day Out.
Source: Mens Day Out
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