Author: G. Harini, Government Law College, Theni
INTRODUCTION:
The Hon’ble Supreme Court of India rendered a landmark decision in the case of Justice K. S. Puttaswamy (Retd.) and Anr. vs Union of India, holding that the right to privacy is a Fundamental Right protected by Articles 14, 19, and 21 of the Indian Constitution. This decision offered a fresh outlook on citizens’ rights to privacy Rachit Garg, “Constitutional Validity of Aadhar Act in the Case of Justice K.S. Puttaswamy (Retd.) and Anr. Vs. Union of India.
This issue reaches out to the foundation of a constitutional culture based on protecting human rights. It allows this Court to revisit the fundamental ideas on which our Constitution has been founded and their consequences for the way of life it seeks to protect. Nine justices of the Supreme Court convened to decide whether privacy is a constitutionally protected value. This case raises issues of constitutional interpretation because it would fundamentally alter our understanding of liberty and the rights that follow from its protection if privacy were to be interpreted as a protected constitutional value.
CITATION:
(2017) 10 SCC 1, AIR 2017 SC 4161
JUDGES:
JUSTICE J.S KHEHAR(CJI), JUSTICE JASTI CHELAMESWAR, JUSTICE D Y CHANDRACHUD, JUSTICE ROHINTON NARIMAN, JUSTICE R K AGARWAL, JUSTICE SANJAY KISHAN KAUL, JUSTICE A NAZEER, JUSTICE SA BOBDE, JUSTICE A M SAPRE.
PARTIES:
PETITIONER / INTERVENORS:
Justice K.S. Puttaswamy, Centre for Civil Society (CSS), S.G. Vombatkere, Mathew Thomas, Raghav Tankha, Kalyani Menon Sen, Ram Prasad Misal, Shantha Sinha.
LAWYERS:
Shyam Divan, Kapil Sibal, Gopal Subramanium, K.V. Vishwanathan, P.Chidambaram, Arvind Datar, Meenakshi Arora, Sajan Poovayya.
RESPONDENTS:
Union of India, Planning Commission, Unique Identification Authority of India, Andra Pradesh, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Gujarat, Goa, Haryana, Himachal, Jharkhand, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Uttarkhand, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Daman and Diu, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, National Capital Territory of Delhi, Andaman Nicobar Islands, Lakshadweep, Chandigarh, Puducherry.
LAWYERS:
K.K. Venugopal, Rakesh Dwivedi, Tushar Mehta.
BACKGROUND OF THE CASE:
The Aadhaar Project, led by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), was the subject of a petition filed by retired Karnataka High Court judge Justice K.S. Puttaswamy, which started this case. The Aadhaar number was a 12-digit identity number that the UIDAI issued to Indian citizens and was connected to a number of welfare schemes in an effort to expedite the process of service delivery and eliminate false beneficiaries. Over time, other petitions challenging various aspects of Aadhaar were also referred to the Supreme Court. In 2015, a three-judge bench of the Court questioned the government’s norms for, and compilation of, demographic biometric data on the grounds of violating the right to privacy. Justice Puttaswamy filed the petition that attempted to challenge the constitutional validity of the Aadhaar card scheme. While addressing these challenges, the three-judge bench noted several Supreme Court decisions in which the right to privacy had been held to be a fundamental right protected by the Constitution. The Attorney General of India argued against the existence of the fundamental right to privacy based on the rulings in M.P. Sharma and Kharak. A Constitution Bench was tasked with examining the case in order to assess the correctness of the subsequent rulings and the precedents established in M.P. Sharma and Kharak Singh. On July 18, 2017, the Constitution Bench determined that a bench of nine judges would be the appropriate body to decide the matter. Nevertheless, these later decisions, which upheld the existence of a constitutionally protected right of privacy, were made by benches with a smaller strength than those in those cases.
ISSUE:
WHETHER THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY WAS A FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT UNDER PART III OF THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA.
ARGUMENTS:
The Respondents primarily relied on the rulings in the M.P. Sharma and Kharak Singh cases, which found that the right to privacy was not expressly protected by the Constitution. These rulings were rendered by an eight-judge and a six-judge bench, respectively, and the Respondents contended that these rulings would supersede any subsequent rulings from smaller benches. The Petitioners submitted that M.P. Sharma and Kharak Singh were based on the ideas presented in A.K. Gopalan vs. State of Madras (1950 SCR 88), while the Respondents further contended that the authors of the Constitution did not intend to make the right to privacy a fundamental right. In Rustom Cavasji Cooper vs. Union of India ((1970) 1 SCC 248), the eleven-judge bench held that A.K. Gopalan, which interpreted every provision in the Chapter on Fundamental Rights as embodying a distinct protection, was not good law. Accordingly, the Petitioners contended that the foundation of the two prior decisions was invalid. Other arguments made during the hearing dealt with the scope of the right to privacy. It was also urged that the minority judgment of Justice Subba Rao in Kharak Singh be specifically approved while the majority decision was overruled in the seven-judge bench decision in Maneka Gandhi vs. Union of India ((1978) 1 SCC 248). The Respondents contended that the right to privacy was a vague concept that could only be defined as a statutory and common law right. The Petitioners contended that the Constitution should be interpreted in accordance with the Preamble, while also acknowledging that privacy is an international human right and a natural right. The Petitioners argued for a multi-dimensional model of privacy as a fundamental right. The respondents pushed for a limited strategy that emphasized the Constitution as the only source of fundamental rights and the Parliament as the only body with the authority to amend it.
DECISION:
The core of the decision spelled out an expansive interpretation of the right to privacy – it was not a narrow right against physical invasion, or a derivative right under Article 21, but one that covered the body and mind, including decisions, choices, information, and freedom. The Supreme Court declared privacy to be a distinct and independent fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution through six separate opinions. The Court overruled the rulings in M.P. Sharma and Kharak Singh, insofar as the latter held that the right to privacy was not a fundamental right. Privacy was held to be an expansive, enforceable right under Part III of the Constitution, with multiple facets. Details regarding the scope of the right were discussed in the various opinions.
In the case of M.P. Sharma, the Court upheld the validity of the ruling, holding that the Indian Constitution did not impose any restrictions on the laws pertaining to search and seizure that were comparable to those found in the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution. The Court overruled the decision in M.P. Sharma, holding that the Fourth Amendment did not provide an exhaustive definition of privacy and that the lack of a comparable protection in the Constitution did not imply that there was no inherent right to privacy in India. The Court rejected Kharak Singh’s insular view of personal liberty, which Justice D.Y. Chandrachud referred to as the “silos” approach borrowed from A.K. Gopalan.
The Court further noted that the majority opinion in Kharak Singh suffered from an internal contradiction, as there was no legal basis to have struck down domiciliary visits and police surveillance on any ground other than privacy – a right which they referenced in theory but held not to be a part of the Constitution. The Court noted that this approach of viewing fundamental rights in watertight compartments was abrogated after Maneka Gandhi. The Court also examined the affirmative case to determine whether the right to privacy was protected under the right to life, personal liberty, and the freedoms guaranteed under Part III of the Constitution. It further held that decisions made after Kharak Singh upheld the right to privacy were to be read subject to the principles laid down in the judgment.
Significantly, while holding that the right to privacy was not absolute in nature, the judgment also provided an overview of the standard of judicial review that must be applied in cases of the State invading an individual’s privacy. The Bench established that privacy was “not an elitist construct” and rejected the Attorney General’s argument that the right to privacy must be forsaken in the interest of welfare entitlements provided by the state. Judge S.K. Kaul added a fourth prong to this test, mandating “procedural guarantees against abuse of such interference.” It held that the right to privacy may be restricted where such an invasion meets the three-fold requirement of legality, which postulates the existence of law; need, defined in terms of a legitimate state aim; and proportionality, which ensures a rational nexus between the objects and the means adopted to achieve them.
Justice J. Chelameswar, however, held that the just, fair, and reasonable standard under Article 21 would apply to other privacy claims, and that the “compelling state interest” standard would be applied based on the particular facts of each case. He further held that the standard of “compelling state interest” was only to be used in privacy claims that deserve “strict scrutiny.” The Court also emphasized that sexual orientation was a fundamental aspect of privacy. It also talked about the positive and negative aspects of the right to privacy, where the State was required to protect an individual’s privacy as well as refrain from violating that right by taking the necessary steps. The Court acknowledged the need for a data protection law but left it up to Parliament to enact legislation on the matter, holding that informational privacy is a component of the right to privacy.
CONCLUSION:
A three-judge panel found that the right to privacy was protected by the Indian Constitution and that the matter should be handled by a higher court. A nine-judge panel decided in this case. Justice K.S. Puttaswamy, a retired Karnataka High Court judge, questioned the constitutional viability of the Aadhaar scheme (Retd.). He claimed that the scheme violated his right to privacy. In Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India and several other cases, a nine-judge Supreme Court bench unanimously decided on August 24, 2017, that every person has a constitutional right to privacy.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
1. WHAT CASE DEALS WITH THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY?
In the Case of Justice K.S. Puttaswamy V. UOI (2017)
2. IS THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY IN INDIA IS A BASIC RIGHT?
The Right to Privacy was essentially recognised as a fundamental right by the Supreme Court in 2017.
3.WHICH ARTICLE OF THE INDIAN CONSTITUTION DEALS WITH RIGHT TO PRIVACY?
Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, 1950 deals with the right to property.
