Right to privacy ruling: A nine-judge bench of the constitution bench unanimously held that right to privacy is a guaranteed fundamental right. Right to privacy ruling: A nine-judge bench of the constitution bench unanimously held that right to privacy is a guaranteed fundamental right.

In a landmark verdict on Thursday, the nine-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court unanimously held that right to privacy is a fundamental right guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution. “Privacy intrinsic to freedom of life and personal liberty guaranteed under Article 21 of Constitution,” the nine-judge bench observed.

Reading out the judgment, Chief Justice of India Justice Khekar overruled the apex court’s previous judgments in two cases where it had held that right to privacy was not protected by Constitution.

Before pronouncing the judgement, the CJI said that among the nine judges some of them have authored different orders.

Senior counsel Prashant Bhushan, who is a party to the case, told reporters: “The judgment doesn’t say anything about the right of citizens to share biometric details for Aadhaar. The nine-judge held that right to privacy is a fundamental right. Any law which is made to restrict this fundamental right will have to be examined keeping Article 21 in mind. For example, if the government tomorrow says that your Aadhaar card will be required for your travel and income tax filings, that in my view these are unreasonable restrictions… it is a setback to the government as they said right to privacy is not a wholly qualified right.”

With the nine-judge bench ruling against the government stand on privacy, the Aadhaar case will now be referred to a five-judge bench which will hear a clutch of petitions challenging the validity of the Act.

Earlier, during the court hearing, the government counsel said privacy is a “wholly qualified right”, implying that it could be subject to reasonable restrictions. However, the apex court today held that privacy is a limited right.

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