The ruling came in a case involving The Open University of Sri Lanka, which had refused to release a student’s marked answer scripts and results from the LLB Selection Test conducted on January 8, 2023.
The request was submitted by R. A. Janaka Roshan Ranasinghe on behalf of his daughter, R. A. D. Sashindya Ranasinghe, after the university declined to provide the documents, arguing that disclosure could undermine the integrity and confidentiality of examinations under Section 5(1)(l) of the RTI Act.
The Right to Information Commission later directed the university to release the information. However, the university challenged the decision before the Court of Appeal, claiming that disclosing marked answer scripts could expose examination structures, compromise confidentiality, and create a damaging precedent for higher education institutions.
Delivering its judgment, the Court of Appeal rejected the university’s arguments and dismissed the revision application, affirming that transparency in academic assessments is protected under Article 14A of the Constitution and the RTI Act.
The Court stressed that there “cannot be hide-and-seek games in higher institutions” and noted that accountability and openness are fundamental principles in publicly funded educational institutions.
The bench further held that denying a student access to their own evaluated answer scripts without clear and evidence-based justification was unlawful. While acknowledging the importance of protecting the identities of examiners, the Court ruled that such concerns do not outweigh a student’s right to understand how their performance was assessed.
The judgment also clarified that university by-laws cannot supersede the provisions of the RTI Act, which prevails over conflicting written laws.
In support of its ruling, the Court referred to both local and international legal precedents, including earlier Sri Lankan Court of Appeal decisions and Indian Supreme Court judgments recognising evaluated answer scripts as personal information that may be disclosed while preserving examiner confidentiality.
The Court additionally criticised the university for bypassing the statutory appeals process and instead seeking discretionary revisionary relief without demonstrating exceptional circumstances.
Accordingly, the Court dismissed the revision application without costs and upheld the RTI Commission’s order directing the university to release the requested information.
