The Centre yesterday told the Supreme Court that since privacy was multifaceted, it could not be treated as a fundamental right
The Supreme Court. Pic for representational purposes
The Centre on Thursday told the Supreme Court that since privacy was multifaceted, it could not be treated as a fundamental right.
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Attorney General K K Venugopal resumed his arguments before a nine-judge bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar, stressing that it was not a fundamental right.
"There is no fundamental right to privacy and even if it is assumed as a fundamental right, it is multifaceted. Every facet can't be ipso facto considered a fundamental right," Venugopal told the bench.
He said "informational privacy" could not be a right to privacy and it could not ever be a fundamental right.
The attorney general had on Wednesday told the bench the right to privacy could be a fundamental right but could not be "absolute".
The contentious issue of whether the right was a fundamental one was referred to a larger bench in 2015 after the Centre underlined two judgments delivered in 1950 and 1962 by the apex court that had held it was not a fundamental right.
The apex court had earlier observed that the State could seek information such as details on the number of children a woman had, but at the same time could not force her to answer a question on how many abortions she'd had.
The court had asked the AG the difference between the right to privacy being considered a common law right and a fundamental right. He had replied that the common law right could be enforced by filing a civil law suit, and if it was considered a fundamental right, the court could enforce it like any other writ.
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