SC declines DMRC's plea against disclosure of info on drawings

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a Delhi Metro Rail Corporation’s plea to allow it not to make public the information on its structural drawings and planning on grounds of national security.

“The Special Leave Petition is dismissed,” said a bench of justices P Sathasivam and J Chelameswar, while dismissing DMRC’s plea against the Delhi High Court’s order to make public its structural drawing.

The high court’s order came in the wake of the July 2009 collapse of a metro corridor pillar at Zamrudpur in south Delhi, killing six persons.

The apex court rejected DMRC’s plea, upholding the HC’s ruling that there was no threat to national security in making public the information on its structural drawings under the Right to Information (RTI) Act.

The HC had given its order on a plea by Delhi-based architect Sudhir Vohra.

DMRC had challenged the August 1, 2011, judgement of the high court’s division bench, which had upheld a single judge bench’s order endorsing the Central Information Commissioner’s March 2010 order to disclose information on the issue.

The architect had filed an application under the RTI Act, asking DMRC to give him all structural drawings of both the pile foundation and the superstructure, including all steel reinforcement details, foundation details, engineering calculations and soil tests.

He had sought these details for metro pillar No. 67, which collapsed on July 12, 2009. DMRC had said it was not only for security reasons but also for commercial considerations that information on structural drawings cannot be made public, as there was fear that the details may go into wrong hands.

In its plea to the apex court, DMRC had said that it is a flagship company and confidentiality of its structural drawings is a key ingredient of its business.