Justice K.S.Puttaswamy(Retd) vs Union Of India on 26 September, 2018 The basic principle of dignity and freedom of the individual is an attribute of natural law which becomes the right of all individuals in a constitutional democracy. Dignity has a central normative role as well as constitutional value. This normative role is performed in three ways: First, it becomes basis for constitutional rights; Second, it serves as an interpretative principle for determining the scope of constitutional rights; and, Third, it determines the proportionality of a statute limiting a constitutional right. Thus, if an enactment puts limitation on a constitutional right and such limitation is disproportionate, such a statute can be held to be unconstitutional by applying the doctrine of proportionality. 106) As per Dworkin, there are two principles about the concept of human dignity. First principle regards an intrinsic value of every person, namely, every person has a special objective value, which value is not only important to that person alone but success or failure of the lives of every person is important to all of us. It can also be described as self respect which represents the free will of the person, her capacity to think for herself and to control her own life. The second principle is that of personal responsibility, which means every person has the responsibility for success in her own life and, therefore, she must use her discretion regarding the way of life that will be successful from her point of view. 107) Sum total of this exposition is well defined by Professor Baxi by explaining that as per the aforesaid view, dignity is to be treated as empowerment which makes a triple demand in the name of respect for human dignity, namely: (i) respect for one's capacity as an agent to make one's own free choices; (ii) respect for the choices so made; and (iii) respect for one's need to have a context and conditions in which one can operate as a source of free and informed choice. 108) In this entire formulation, respect for an individual is the fulcrum, which is based on the principle of freedom and capacity to make choices and a good or just social order is one which respects dignity via assuring contexts and conditions as the source of free and informed choice. 109) The aforesaid discourse on the concept of human dignity is from an individual point of view. That is the emphasis of the petitioners as well. That would be one side of the coin. A very important feature which the present case has brought into focus is another dimension of human dignity, namely, in the form of common good or public good. Thus, our endeavour here is to give richer and more nuanced understanding to the concept of human dignity. Here, dignity is not limited to an individual and is to be seen in an individualistic way. A reflection on this facet of human dignity was stated in National Legal Services Authority (Transgenders case), which can be discerned from the Indian Kanoon - http://indiankanoon.org/doc/127517806/ 100