Section 2(j) (ii)[1] of the RTI Act, 2005 (RTI Act) provides the right to the RTI applicant to seek certified copies of documents and records from a public authority. Many a times, the Central Public Information Officers (CPIOs) are not aware of how, these certified copies are to be provided, as both the RTI Act and the RTI Rules, 2012 are silent on this aspect.
How to provide certified copies:
Department of Personnel and Training (“the DoPT”), Government of India, through an office memorandum dated 6.10.2015[2] (“OM”) has clarified that while providing any certified copy of any document or record under the RTI Act, “…the CPIO should endorse on the document “True copy of the document/record supplied under RTI Act”, sign the document with date, above a seal containing name of the officer, CPIO and name of public authority…”
Thus, as per the above OM, to certify any document or record, the CPIO has to endorse the document as a “True Copy”, add his signatures and seal containing his name, the title of CPIO and the name of his public authority.
Does “True Copy” mean that the document/record is genuine:
If the CPIO certifies the document as “True Copy”, would it mean that the document is authentic. This aspect has been clarified by the Kerala High Court[3] by holding that on a request of certified copies, the CPIO has to only certify that it is a copy issued under the RTI Act, the CPIO is not called upon to certify that it is a copy of a genuine document.
In fact, the Central Information Commission (“the CIC”) in one of its early decisions had held that “certified copies” which is a specific category of documents should not be confused with “authenticated copies” or “true copies” and the usage of “certified copies” in Section 2(j) of the RTI Act is in the context of Sections 74 and 76 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (“the Evidence Act”)[4].
While, Section 74 of the Evidence Act, lists the documents which are public documents, Section 76 explains which copies of the public documents will be called as certified copies and how these certified copies are to be provided by a public officer.
The method provided under Section 76 is that the concerned public officer will provide a certificate written at the foot of the copy that, it is a true copy of the document or part thereof. Such a certificate will be dated and subscribed by the public officer with his name and his name and his official title, and shall be sealed, whenever such officer is authorized by law to make use of a seal.
Thus, under the RTI Act, when the CPIO certifies the copy of a document or record as a “True Copy”, he is not certifying that it is a copy of a genuine document/record or is verifying the authenticity of the original document. He is just certifying that, he is providing under the RTI Act, a true copy of the original document or record which is available with his public authority.
[1] (j) “right to information” means the right to information accessible under this Act which is held by or under the control of any public authority and includes the right to— (i) inspection of work, documents, records; (ii) taking notes, extracts or certified copies of documents or records; (iii) taking certified samples of material; (iv) obtaining information in the form of diskettes, floppies, tapes, video cassettes or in any other electronic mode or through printouts where such information is stored in a computer or in any other device;
[2] OM of the DoP&T No. 10/1/2013-IR dated 06.10.2015.
[3] John Numpeli v. The PIO, W.P. (C) No. 31947 of 2012 (P) dated 31.01.2017.
[4] Shri V.T. Gokhale vs Securities And Exchange Board of India dated 27 August, 2010, F.No.CIC/AT/A/2010/000339 & F.No.CIC/AT/C/2010/000381.
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