SC in-house committee report clearing CJI should be made public: Ex-Information Commissioner

Former Information Commissioner Sridhar Acharyulu has advocated making public the report of the Supreme Court's in-house inquiry committee which looked into the allegations of sexual harassment levelled against the Chief Justice of India by a former woman employee of the apex court, saying the decision to withhold the finding "appears to have no reason or legal base".

"The people of this country are informed that the in-house committee of Supreme Court consisting of three judges has cleared Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi of sexual harassment allegations raised by a former employee claiming 'no substance' in the complaint," he said.

According to the CJI and other dignitaries, there is a "larger conspiracy" behind this allegation, Acharyulu said.

"...public interest gives rise to a right of public to know and hence the report should have been made public after redacting the details if need not be disclosed, especially in complaints like sexual harassment," he said.

The three-member committee had on Monday given clean chit to Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, saying it "found no substance" in the allegations. The apex court administration later said the report "is not liable to be made public", citing the verdict in the 2003 case of Indira Jaising vs Supreme Court of India.

Acharyulu said, "As per Indira Jaising order, the enquiry into Mysore incident was informal and only to gather some information from colleague judges, but in this case, it is a statutorily mandated inquiry and it is not opinion collection or information gathering."