Justice K.S. Puttaswamy (Retd.) v. Union of India, The Right to Privacy Judgment
Background
The case arose out of petitions (originally filed by retired Karnataka High Court judge Justice K.S. Puttaswamy) challenging the Aadhaar biometric identification scheme, which required the Union Government to argue that the Constitution did not guarantee a fundamental right to privacy, relying on two earlier large-bench decisions, M.P. Sharma (1954, 8 judges) and Kharak Singh (1962, 6 judges), which contained observations that privacy was not constitutionally protected. Because several later, smaller-bench decisions had treated privacy as part of the fundamental right to life and liberty, creating an apparent conflict in the law, a three-judge bench in 2015 referred the core constitutional question to a larger bench, which was eventually escalated to a nine-judge Constitution Bench to authoritatively resolve it.
Decision Breakdown
The nine-judge bench unanimously held that the right to privacy is a fundamental right, protected as an intrinsic part of the right to life and personal liberty under Article 21 and as part of the freedoms guaranteed by Part III of the Constitution. The Court expressly overruled M.P. Sharma and the relevant part of Kharak Singh insofar as they had held privacy was not constitutionally protected, and confirmed that later decisions recognizing privacy as a protected right (such as Gobind, Rajagopal, and PUCL) correctly stated the law. The judges reasoned that privacy is essential to individual liberty, dignity, and autonomy, that it is not an elitist or purely common-law concept but a natural, inalienable right, and that like other fundamental rights it is not absolute: it can be restricted by a law that is necessary for a legitimate state aim and proportionate to that aim, subject to procedural safeguards against abuse. The ruling did not itself decide the validity of the Aadhaar scheme; it answered only the preliminary constitutional reference, after which the specific Aadhaar challenges were to proceed before an appropriate bench applying this newly settled position on privacy.
Lesson Learnt
The right to privacy, covering control over one's personal information, bodily autonomy, choices in family and relationships, and protection from unwarranted surveillance by both the State and private entities, is now constitutionally guaranteed in India as part of the right to life and liberty, though like other fundamental rights it can be reasonably and proportionately restricted by law for legitimate purposes such as national security or public interest.