According to Black’s Law Dictionary privacy means “right to be let alone; the right of a person to be free from any unwarranted publicity; the right to live without any unwarranted interference by the public in matters with which the public is not necessarily concerned”.

Privacy is the right to control who knows what about a person, and under what conditions, thereby controlling the intimacies of life. It is also about secrecy, and the right to determine for oneself if and to what extent personal information is disclosed. However technology has invaded every part of our lives and it is very difficult to maintain the level of privacy we desire. Right to privacy ensures that personal emails, bank details and medical records are safe and secure. This is essential to human dignity and autonomy in all societies around the world.

Article 21 of the Constitution of India states that “No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law”. The term ‘life’ as per Article 21 means all those aspects of life which go to make a man’s life meaningful, complete and worth living. Privacy is inseparable from liberty, and without privacy there can be no true liberty.

The Supreme Court in the case of R. Rajagopal v. State of Tamil Nadu 1994 SCC (6) 632., for the first time directly linked the right to privacy to Article 21 of the Constitution and laid down that the right to privacy is implicit in the right to life and liberty guaranteed to the citizens of India by Article 21. It was further held that privacy is a “right to be let alone” and that a citizen has a right to safeguard the privacy of his own, his family, marriage, procreation, motherhood, child bearing and education among other matters. None can publish anything concerning the above matters without his consent whether truthful or otherwise and whether laudatory or critical. If he does, he would be violating the right to privacy of the person concerned and would be liable in an action for damages.

While deciding on the issue of telephone tapping in the case of PUCL v. Union of India (1997) 1 SCC 30 , the Supreme Court observed that telephone-tapping would be a serious invasion of an individual’s privacy. Thus, telephone-tapping would infract Article 21 of the Constitution, unless it is permitted under the procedure established by law.

In the case of Selvi v. State of Karnataka AIR 2010 SC 1974 the Supreme Court held that an involuntary subjection of a person to narcoanalysis, polygraph examination and BEAP tests violates the right to privacy. In Govind v. State of Madhya Pradesh AIR 1975 SC 1378, Mathew, J. accepted the right to privacy as an emanation from Art. 19(a), (d) and 21, but right to privacy is not absolute right. Assuming that the fundamental rights explicitly guaranteed to a citizen have penumbral zones and that the right to privacy is itself a fundamental right, the fundamental right must be subject to restriction on the basis of compelling public interest. It was held that surveillance by domiciliary visits need not always be an unreasonable encroachment on the privacy of a person owing to the character and antecedents of the person subjected to surveillance as also the objects and the limitation under which the surveillance is made. The right to privacy deals with ‘persons not places’.

In Smt. Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India & Anr.,(1978), the Judge Bench said ‘personal liberty’ in article 21 covers a variety of rights & some have status of fundamental rights and given additional protection under Article 19. The Triple Test for any law interfering with personal liberty laid down was: (1) It should prescribe a procedure; (2) the procedure must withstand the test of one or more of the fundamental rights conferred u/a 19 which may be applicable in a given situation and (3) It must withstand test of Article 14. The law and procedure authorizing interference with personal liberty and right of privacy must also be right, just and fair and not arbitrary, fanciful or oppressive. In Naz Foundation Case (2009) Delhi HC gave the landmark decision on consensual homosexuality. In this case S. 377 IPC and Articles 14, 19 & 21 were examined. Right to privacy held to protect a “private space in which man may become and remain himself”. It was said individuals need a place of sanctuary where they can be free from societal control- where individuals can drop the mask, desist for a while from projecting on the world the image they want to be accepted as themselves, an image that may reflect the values of their peers rather than the realities of their nature.