PM Modi’s degree row: Delhi HC quashes CIC order on disclosure of Delhi University’s records from 1978

The Delhi High Court on Monday (August 25, 2025) quashed the Central Information Commission’s (CIC) 2016 order permitting an RTI activist to inspect Delhi University’s 1978 BA records, the year Prime Minister Narendra Modi graduated.

The Court’s order came on an appeal filed by DU against the CIC’s December 21, 2016 order. The court had stayed the CIC’s order on the very first date of hearing, January 24, 2017.

On the RTI plea of one activist Neeraj, the CIC had ordered DU to allow inspection of its register containing details of all students who passed the BA examination in 1978 — including their roll numbers, names, fathers’ names and marks — and to provide certified extracts of the relevant pages.

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In its plea, the DU had contended that its cannot reveal details personal information of all students, who had appeared in Bachelor of Arts in the Year 1978, the year PM Modi cleared the degree.

DU had argued that the information of students is held in “fiduciary capacity, the same is exempt from disclosure” under the RTI Act. DU had said the CIC order had “far-reaching adverse consequences” for all universities in the country that held degrees of crores of students.

Previously, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing DU, argued that the purpose of RTI was not to satiate a third party’s curiosity.

“Section 6 provides a mandate that information will have to be given, that is the purpose. But the RTI act is not for the purpose of satisfying someone’s curiosity,” Mr. Mehta had argued.

The CIC, in its order, told DU to allow inspection and rejected the argument of its public information officer that it was a third party personal information, observing there was “neither merit, nor legality” in it.