Constitution guarantees Right to Privacy as Fundamental Right: Supreme Court

- Ishita Gupta (ishgupta.97@gmail.com)

A much awaited decision, challenging the Central government’s move, making Aadhaar mandatory for availing various social schemes, was ruled by a Nine-judge Constitution bench, headed by Chief Justice J.S. Khehar. Though orders made it clear that the ‘right is not absolute and is subjected to reasonable restrictions. Landmark judgement of the Supreme Court which came on august 24, 2017 ruled that, “Right to Privacy is an intrinsic part of Right to Life and Personal Liberty under Article 21 and entire Part III of the constitution”. .

As a consequence of K.K. Venugopal’s, India’s Attorney general Argument with the formal attorney general Mukul Rohtagi over subjecting privacy as a fundamental right during the initial July, 2017 hearings, kicked off the nine-judge bench which examined whether privacy could be examined as a fundamental right. “The right of privacy may at best be common right law, but not a fundamental right guaranteed by the constitution, said K.K. Venugopal during the hearing. To this Justice Bobde noted, “This submission is difficult to accept. Privacy has the nature of being both a common law right as well as a fundamental right. 

The judges rejected the government’s stance that privacy was already protected by various statutes, and that it does not require elevation to a fundamental right status. According to media reports, Justice Kaul said: ‘It is a right which protects the inner sphere of the individual from interference from both State and Non-State actors and allows the individual to make autonomous life choices. Let the right of privacy, an inherent right, be unequivocally a fundamental right embedded in Part III of the constitution of India, but subject to the restrictions specified, relatable to that part”.

While the Supreme Court’s judgement was limited to the issue of right to privacy, the matter of whether Aadhaar violates the right to privacy has to be dealt by the five- judge bench, hearing the petitions since 2015. On the issue of collecting data without consent, as Aadhaar becomes mandatory, Justice SA Bobde said that “ the non- consensual revelation of personal information, including health records, finances, place of residence, location etc. , efface one’s sense of personal and financial security”.

However, the judges also mentioned limitations to privacy, aligning with the justification for Aadhaar. Justice Chandrachud ruled, “Creating regimes for data protection requires a careful and sensitive balance between individual interests and legitimate concerns of the state. Encouraging innovation, spread of knowledge and dissipation of social welfare benefits, are some of the state’s legitimate concerns”, he said.

Though the government has not said that Aadhaar is a tool for national security, it has persistently claimed that it has helped save public money which could have effused from social welfare schemes. Also, the data collected through Aadhaar can help in research and create better policy, it added, according to sources.