🧷 Authentic Classroom Explanation by IAS Monk

📍 The Question:

‘Right to Privacy’ is protected under which Article of the Constitution of India?

(a) Article 15
(b) Article 19
(c) Article 21
(d) Article 29

✅ Correct Answer: (c)

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🔎 Curiosity Raiser (UPSC focus)

UPSC is testing whether you remember where privacy finally found its constitutional home, after decades of judicial hesitation and evolution.

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🧠 Core Concept Tested

Judicial interpretation of Fundamental Rights under Article 21

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🔍 Classroom Explanation (UPSC Prelims Focused)

• In K. S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017), a 9-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court:
  • unanimously held that Right to Privacy is a Fundamental Right.
• The Court located this right within Article 21:
  • “No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law.”
• Privacy was held to be an intrinsic part of life and personal liberty.

👉 Hence, Article 21 is the correct answer.

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❌ Why other options are incorrect

• Article 15 → Prohibits discrimination
• Article 19 → Protects specific freedoms (speech, movement, etc.)
• Article 29 → Cultural and educational rights
• None of these directly protect privacy.

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📘 Enrich Notes (Prelims Value Add)

• Puttaswamy Judgment (2017):
  • Overruled earlier positions in M.P. Sharma (1954) and Kharak Singh (1962) to the extent they denied privacy as a fundamental right.
• Privacy now covers:
  • bodily autonomy
  • informational privacy
  • decisional autonomy

📌 Prelims Recall Line
Privacy lives inside liberty — Article 21.

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🧘‍♂️ IAS Monk Whisper

Liberty is incomplete without privacy,
and privacy breathes through Article 21.

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