Supreme Court declares right to privacy as a fundamental right
The Supreme Court has declared right to privacy as a fundamental right under the constitution on Thursday under Article 21 of the constitution.
A nine-judge Constitution Bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar with others members of the Bench comprising Justices J Chelameswar, S A Bobde, R K Agrawal, R F Nariman, A M Sapre, D Y Chandrachud, S K Kaul and S Abdul Nazeer shared the same view.
This verdict was to determine whether the submission of an individual’s Aadhaar number can be made compulsory for access to government schemes. The question of whether Aadhaar is violating this fundamental right was taken up by the five judge constitution bench.
The Bench assembled on July 19 had heard several senior advocates, including Attorney General KK Venugopal. For a period of six days the bench had tried to reach a conclusion on the issue.
Right to privacy was a fundamental right but a qualified one. He asserted the government had a right to regulate it through a law, Attorney General said.
“This is not the case of interpretation of the Constitution or the law. This is the case of introduction of a right as a fundamental right. This can be done only by Parliament,” senior counsel CA Sundaram had told the Bench on behalf of the Maharashtra Government.
On the other hand senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi had told the Bench that some aspects of privacy may be traced to various fundamental rights but basic personal information is needed to bring forth transparency to the authority.
Sankaranarayanan raised questions and said, while all of us using smart phones download applications and let them access / allow them insight to our photo gallery, contacts etc, which leads to waiving our privacy. But if raised the same at fundamental level, it cannot be waived.
-PTC News
