New Delhi, August 24: The Supreme Court on Thursday held Right to Privacy as a fundamental right. The nine-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar unanimously pronounced that privacy was a fundamental right. The landmark judgement by the Supreme Court has overruled the 1954 judgment by Justice MP Sharma and the 1962 judgment by Justice Kharak Singh.
The court, in its ruling, said that anything that infringes the privacy of a citizen will be struck down. The court ruled that Right to Privacy is an intrinsic part of life and personal liberty under Article 21.
Speaking to the media after the historic judgment, Prashant Bhushan, one of the petitioners in the case, said that this was a landmark judgement. He, however, said that the judgment does not say anything on sharing biometric details for Aadhaar card. Bhushan said that the Aadhaar specifics will be decided by a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court separately taking into consideration the court’s verdict on privacy.
While whether privacy is a fundamental right or not has been debated ever since 1954, the case in point dates back to petitions filed in 2015 against making Aadhaar mandatory. Here is a timeline of the hearing. A batch of petitioners challenged the government’s decision to make Aadhaar mandatory. The petitioners say that mandatory use of Aadhaar is an infringement of privacy.
Senior advocate Gopal Subramaniam, who is one of the petitioners in the case, argued before the Supreme Court that right to privacy is associated with a person’s honour and therefore should be considered as a fundamental right which the “state shall take all measures to protect”. “The right to privacy is recognised as a fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution. The concept of privacy is embedded in liberty as well as a person’s honour,” he argued before the bench.
The Centre, however, maintained that Aadhaar doesn’t pose a threat to privacy. It has also maintained that right to privacy is not a fundamental right. Attorney general KK Venugopal countered the petitioners’ arguments claiming that right to privacy is “conditional”, despite being fundamental. Here are the arguments made in the case
“Privacy is a species of liberty, which is subordinate to the right to life. Aadhaar is to secure the poor’s right to life such as food and shelter,” Venugopal had said. He further claimed that the mandatory usage of Aadhaar for availing social security benefits has allowed the government to plunge the loopholes in the system which deprived the poor their rights.
According to Venugopal, the “elitist” perspective of right to privacy could destroy the “right to life” of 270 million poor people in the nation, adding that “right to life” is a more essential fundamental right as compared to privacy.
The court ruling is expected to have its repercussions on not just the Aadhaar case, but also on the validity of Section 377, and also the cases of privacy in Whatsapp and Facebook filed by petitioners. However, it remains to be seen whether the requirement of biometrics of Aadhaar is impacted by this judgment.
