C
in K. S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017) 10 SCC 1
[“Puttaswamy (Privacy)”] and K. S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India
(2018) 12 SCALE 1 [“Puttaswamy (Aadhaar)”].
Petitioner No. 1 herein, i.e. the Internet Freedom Foundation
[“IFF”], is a registered charitable Trust, setup inter alia to protect,
promote and defend human rights of citizens using information
communication technologies, and it has proactively intervened and
assisted courts in India on cases affecting the rights of citizens for an
open, equitable and secure access to the Internet. The Petitioner-Trust
is deeply concerned by the pervasive, sweeping, and clandestine
activities
of
the
State
to
intercept,
monitor,
and
decrypt
communications and other data generated, stored, shared, or transmitted
through digital platforms.
The Petition submits that the relaxation of the rules of locus
standi and the jurisprudential evolution of PILs is oriented towards this
Hon’ble Court functioning as the last bulwark of liberty in cases
precisely like the present one, where there is little scope for the subject
of surveillance to approach a Court in specific instances, since the
system itself is covert.
Therefore, with little or no possibility of individuals detecting
and complaining of legal injury, it is imperative for this Hon’ble Court
to test the constitutionality of the surveillance system erected by the
impugned provisions along with the impugned notification, especially
since its very existence, in the absence of any independent oversight,
impacts the fundamental rights of citizens.
i. First and foremost, the very act of surveillance – taken on its own
– infringes fundamental rights under Articles 19(1)(a) and 21.
While the “harm” that surveillance causes cannot be quantified in
a physical or tangible form, this Hon’ble Court has never insisted