Supreme Court upholds right to privacy as a fundamental right

In a landmark judgement, the Supreme Court on Thursdayupheld the Right to Privacy as a fundamental right protected by the Constitution of India, a verdict that could impact the government's unique identification Aadhaar programme.

The nine-judge constitutional benchunanimously held that an individual's right to privacy was protected as a part of the rights under Article 21 of the Constitution.

Privacywas "protected as an intrinsic part of Article 21 that protects life and liberty,"Chief Justice JSKhehar said in a brief statement.

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The Supreme Court overruled the MPSharma (1962) and Kharak Singh (1954) judgementswhich heldthattheright to privacy was not a fundamental right.

The bench was hearing a bunch of petitions challenging the mandatory use of the biometric identification cards, known as Aadhaar, as an infringement of privacy.

A five-judge constitutional bench will decide separately whether Aadhaar violates the Right to Privacy or not.

The government had earlier argued that the right to privacy was a "wholly qualified right" which allowed the government to interfere in a matter in special circumstances.

Attorney General KK Venugopal had earlier told the top court that "privacy, as a fundamental right, could have been mentioned in Article 21, but has been omitted. Right to life transcends right to privacy".

The government view was thatthe right to privacy wasnot an individual right and is only a common law right evolved through judicial decisions. It argued thatprivacy as a "vague and amorphous" right which cannot be granted primacy if it deprives poor peopletheir rights to life, food and shelter. It held thatAadhaar wasnecessary for various measures like bringing people under the tax network, opening bank accounts, securing loans for cash transfers and subsidies.

The petitioners contended that enforcing Aadhaar wasan encroachment on privacy, adding that the right to privacy was"inalienable" and "inherent" to the most important fundamental right -the right to liberty.

They argued that the right to liberty includes theright to privacy and is a pre-existing "natural right" which the Constitution acknowledgesand guaranteesto the citizens in case of infringement by the state.

During the arguments, the top court hadfavoured overarching guidelines to protect private information in the public domain. It has observedthereisa need to "maintain the core of privacy" as the notion of privacy is fast becoming irrelevant in an all- pervading technological era.

The nine-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice JS Khehar had on August 2 reserved its verdict after hearing marathon arguments over a period of three weeks for and against the issue.

While reserving its verdict, the bench had voiced concern over the possible misuse of personal information in the public domain and said that protection of the concept of privacy in the all-pervading technological era was a "losing battle".

The decision to set up the nine-judge bench was taken to examine the correctness of two Supreme Court judgements delivered in the Kharak Singh and MP Sharma cases which weredecided by six and eight judge benches.

On July 19, during the course of arguments, the court observed that the right to privacy cannot be an absolute right and the state may have some power to put reasonable restrictions.

The high-profile arguments also saw the top court asking searching questions about the contours of right to privacy in the digital age when personal information was randomly shared with all types of government and private entities.

The bench had wanted to know about the tests which could be used to regulate and enforce privacy right when there could be "legitimate or illegitimate" use of data.