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    Govt must regulate social media, telcos to protect citizens’ privacy: Salve to SC

    Synopsis

    Senior advocate Harish N Salve has been fighting for citizen's rights and privacy in the Supreme Court against social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook as well as telecom companies and cricket board. To safeguard the privacy controls, Salve has suggested state intervention in the same by creating a protective ecosystem.

    harish-salve-BCCL
    Senior advocate Harish N Salve has been fighting for citizens' rights and privacy
    New Delhi: The state must regulate private entities such as WhatsApp, Facebook, telecom companies and even the cricket board to ensure that citizen’s rights and privacy are not eroded in any manner, senior advocate Harish N Salve argued in the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

    The state must create an ecosystem where the rights of citizens are ensured and not taken away, Salve said.

    He was arguing as the amicus curiae on a petition, which has sought curbs on the right of free speech of ministers so as to prevent prejudice to the rights of a citizen to a free and impartial probe.

    A bench led by former Chief Justice Dipak Misra had referred the issue to a larger five-judge bench at the insistence of Salve, who had urged the court to curb the tendency of ministers to air their personal views in the cabinet form of collective responsibility.

    Ministers should restrict themselves to only airing the official views of the Cabinet, he had said. The issue had cropped up after Azam Khan, who was a minister in Uttar Pradesh at the time, dismissed the claims of a rape victim, saying that the alleged crime had never happened.

    Her family filed a petition saying that her right to a free and fair probe had been compromised by the minister’s statement, especially when he was the man in charge of the home ministry to which the police were accountable.

    The top court is now examining all aspects of this issue — whether it could be dealt with under tort law or whether existing penal provisions were enough, and also whether it needed to evolve a code of conduct for ministers.

    In this context, Salve suggested that the state regulate telecom operators, and others like WhatsApp and Facebook to check infringement of privacy of citizens and erosion of the other fundamental liberties guaranteed to them.

    “If the state has an ecosystem in which citizens can enjoy their rights, the rest will fall into place,” Salve said. He suggested a Vishakha model to frame a code of conduct for those holding public office.

    The senior lawyer also called upon the court to junk its functionality test which mandated the court to examine if state control over any private entity was all pervasive before it could be held accountable for infringing fundamental rights.

    In the US, a lady, stopping traffic for schoolchildren to cross the road, was held to be carrying out a public function, he said. He cited the example of social media and tabloid press to argue that those in public office cannot spew nonsense. They are after all under an oath to protect the rights of citizens, he said.

    Senior advocate Rajeev Dhavan, in contrast, wondered about the sagacity of allowing the state to make all sorts of regulations and in the process becoming all-pervasive. Further arguments will continue.


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