The CCG Privacy High Court Tracker is a resource consisting of decisions on the constitutional right to privacy passed by all High Courts in India. The Privacy High Court Tracker captures cases post the pronouncement of the Justice (Retd.) K.S. Puttaswamy vs. Union of India (Puttaswamy) judgment. In Puttaswamy, the Supreme Court of India reaffirmed the existence of the right to privacy in India’s Constitution as a fundamental right.
The Privacy High Court Tracker is a tool to enable lawyers, judges, policymakers, legislators, civil society organisations, academic and policy researchers and other relevant stakeholders, to engage with, understand and analyse the evolving privacy law and jurisprudence across India. The cases deal with the following aspects of privacy (1) autonomy, (2) bodily integrity, (3) data protection, (4) dignity, (5) informational privacy, (6) phone tapping, (7) press freedom, (8) right to know and access information, and (9) surveillance, search and seizure.
The tracker currently only consists of cases reported on Manupatra, and those reported upto 15 December 2023 (CCG will continue to update the tracker periodically). Only final judgements are included in the tracker, and not interim orders of the High Courts.
Show methodologyBodily Integrity || Meghalaya High Court
2 Judge
Decision date - 23.06.2021
Citation - MANU/MG/0061/2021
Case type - Public Interest Litigation
Case status - Listed
Legal provisions - Article 21 of the Constitution of India, 1950.
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"Article 21 encompasses within its fold, right to health, as a fundamental right. By that same analogy, right to health care, which includes vaccination, is a fundamental right. However, vaccination by force or being made mandatory by adopting coercive methods, vitiates the very fundamental purpose of the welfare attached to it." "Question also arises whether fundamental right can be forcefully imposed even if the beneficiary is not inclined to its exercise, because, if the latter is undertaken, then there is a risk of running into infringing on the fundamental right to privacy and exercise of personal liberty. " "[R]ight to and the welfare policy for vaccination can never affect a major fundamental right; i.e., right to life, personal liberty and livelihood, especially when there exists no reasonable nexus between vaccination and prohibition of continuance of occupation and/or profession."
Read moreInformational Privacy || Meghalaya High Court
1 Judge
Decision Date - 06.10.2023
Citation - Crl. Petn. No. 79 of 2023
Case Type - Criminal Petition
Case Status - Petition dismissed
Legal Provisions - Section 23 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012; Section 228A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 and Section 74 of the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015.
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"The proposition of law laid down in the aforementioned judgment makes it amply clear that Section 23 of the POCSO Act prohibits disclosure of identity of a child in any manner. The intention of the legislature is that the identity of a child should not be disclosed directly or indirectly and the privacy and the reputation of the child should not be harmed. Any particular which may lead to the identification of a child cannot be disclosed in the media. Any person committing breach of the said requirement of law shall be prosecuted in terms of Section 23(4) of the said Act."
Read moreSection 23 of the POCSO Act applies not only to publishers and owners of media outlets but also to reporters or contributors of news.
Read moreMethodology
The Privacy High Court Tracker has been developed using judgements pulled from the Manupatra case law database. Through its search function, CCG identified cases that relied upon the Puttaswamy judgment and were pertaining to the right to privacy, and filtered them by each of the 25 High Courts in India. These were then further examined to identify those cases whose decisions concerned a core aspect of privacy. CCG identified the following aspects of privacy (1) autonomy, (2) bodily integrity, (3) data protection, (4) dignity, (5) informational privacy, (6) phone tapping, (7) press freedom, (8) right to know and access information, and (9) surveillance, search and seizure. Cases where only incidental or passing observations or references were made to Puttaswamy and the right to privacy were not included in the tracker. The selected cases were then compiled into the database per High Court, with several details highlighted for ease of reference. These details consist of case name, decision date, case citation and number, case status, legal provisions involved, and bench strength. The tracker also includes select quotes concerning the right to privacy from each case, to assist users to more easily and quickly grasp the crux of the case.
For ease of access to the text of the judgments, each case on our tracker is linked to the Indian Kanoon version of the judgment (wherever available) or an alternative open-access version of the judgment text.
We welcome your feedback. In addition, you may write to us at - ccg@nludelhi.ac.in with the details of any privacy case we may not have included from any High Court in India.
