Kerala bats for right to privacy

Vital to protect private domains, personal intimacies, LDF govt. tells SC

Privacy should be declared a fundamental right to protect citizens from intrusions by the State. In the modern world, technology has advanced so much that “what is whispered in the closet is heard in the street”, the LDF government in Kerala told the Supreme Court.

The submission to a nine-judge Constitution Bench, led by Chief Justice of India J.S. Khehar, came before the marathon arguments on the question of whether the right to privacy is a fundamental right was wrapped up for judgment.

Misuse of Aadhaar

In the constitutional reference before the Bench, the Pinarayi Vijayan government supported the case of petitioners that technology would progress so much that data collected through Aadhaar could be used for surveillance, if not now, in the future.

This was a significant intervention as other State governments had mostly intervened to submit that privacy should be recognised as a statutory right and not a fundamental right.

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Kerala said privacy, like any other fundamental right, is not “absolute”. But it is a fundamental right nevertheless.

“The fact that like any other fundamental right, right to privacy is also not an absolute right is not an enough ground to deny the existence of Right to Privacy as fundamental right,” Kerala said in its written submissions before the court.

The government said privacy encompassed the “personal intimacies of the home, family, marriage, motherhood, procreation, child rearing, feelings, love and passion, etc. A person’s thought process, fantasies, etc., would also necessarily come under his Right to Privacy”.

Invasion of technology

“We are in the digital age. If the intimate details of his/her body, mind, thought process and fantasies are not treated as Right to Privacy— as part of Right to Life and Personal Liberty — under Article 21 of the Constitution, the state could map out these private domains of the person with invasive/un-invasive methods to be developed in this high tech world of digital era, especially when there is no fool-proof data protection regime,” Kerala, represented by counsel V.P. Surendranath and Nishe Rajan Shonker, said.