This is in India, but coming soon to a country near you (or the one you are in already).
Supreme Court outlaws clothes. What criminal acts are hiding in those robs? Only the guilty would hide it
Oh dear god, I thought this was the US Supreme Court, which is bound by the 4th Amendment. Turns out this is the Supreme Court from the State of Telangana in India.
It’s the Supreme Court of India not Telangana which is a state in India.
I presume they’re okay with the first surveillance cameras being in their bedrooms then.
I feel like the best way to combat this is to dig up info on politicians and release it all publicly. Nothing illegal about that. If I knew how, I would.
Didn’t Jon Oliver threaten to do that in an episode about data brokers? Not sure if he ever did. ****
I have a lot of things I want to hide from every single government.
To them I’d say, Define “nothing”, and then tell me that’s a constant.
Nothing to hide = nothing to show.
I’d like to go to one of their houses and tell them I want to search the place. After all, they shouldn’t mind if they have nothing to hide, right?
Probably a bluff.
I’m sure they’d not want you to find their dungeon, or evidence of their corruption and bribery.
[Edit: nor just all the usual parts of privacy and data integrity.]
Just wait until we develop psychic powers.
Let’s see how private your thoughts will be then.
This is just to get us accustomed to the idea that privacy will be nonexistent at some point.
The CIA already tried that. It isn’t going to work.
First attempts almost never work. Just wait until they make it better and develop more powerful psychic abilities like in Stellaris.
Not their pathetic attempts from project stargate
Until they do. What is legal today could be illegal tomorrow.
this is key to tell the folks who think the constitution matters. they’re called “amendments” for a reason lol.
Military is a good example.
First people who were gay were removed.
Then don’t ask don’t tell.
Then it was okay.
Now it’s not and they’re being removed and many outed themselves once it was okay.
One day, you’re not a terrorist. Then on Sept 22 2025 you are because you don’t support fascism.
‘People with nothing to hide’ don’t exist. All of us have something that we’d like to keep private or even secret.
Sometimes it’s little silly things we do when nobody’s watching, like tasting our pets’ food. Other times it’s porn and what specific kind we read/watch/play. And in a tiny, miniscule minority of cases it’s crime. Even fewer of those cases are crimes that actually hurt anyone.
Depriving 99.99% of the population (the remaining 0.01% are politicians) of basic rights just to pretend you’re stopping crime that 0.001% of the population is comitting. Pretend, because we know it doesn’t even work anyway.
Nearly 25 years of mass, global surveillance by the NSA, CIA and FBI, and they failed to catch even a single terrorist or terrorist-to-be. Meanwhile there’s a public shooting almost every day.
It’s not just about basic human rights or fundamental principles of society. These programs simply don’t work. It’s a waste of resources. The only result is bulk data gathering on the citizens. I wonder what that could be used for…?
And when they did catch mass shooters or terrorists it was usually due to an informant or someone who knew the would-be criminal and reported on them.
Meaning a trick that dates literally to antiquity is still the main way they are thwarted.
Supreme Court of India was sold out to the ruling party long ago.
As is a lot of other countries. It’s a growing trend that should alarm everyone.
And countries like Russia, North Korea, and China should all serve as examples of what happens when ruling parties get their way.
So true.
China is awesome, what do you mean?
Blink twice if you’re behind a firewall
Funny seeing comments here assuming the post is about the Default Country instead of India.
I may have nothing to hide, but I have absolutely NOTHING I want any govt to see.
I wouldn’t want people to know what financial transactions I had in 2008, not because they were suspicious, but because the type of person who wants to know should scare anyone. Imagine if someone came up to you and listed every grocery item you bought in the last ten years I would be very concerned.
That is a very rapey mentality
That’s India in a nutshell, unfortunately.
Feels like editorialization to me. The author could at least have titled it “Supreme court asks”, rather than making it seem as if the court passed a judgement enabling free surveillance.
The judge posed an oral argument, and the Solicitor General provided a counter. It’s good that these comments were recorded as it takes the debate forward and shows that a respected lawyer is taking the side of privacy, even if for the sake of winning his case.
There is a lot to criticize about India (my country), but headlines like these just make people angry or assume that it’s hopeless to fight back, because “it’s the same everywhere”. Recognize the harm that it does to our collective mental health and morale. This article could have been titled “Solicitor General upholds the right to privacy in the Supreme Court”, and people would have felt more optimistic and ready to tackle related issues in their own lives. It’s all about the way you spin it.
===================================
Article text: The Supreme Court on Friday (December 19, 2025) reasoned that people with nothing to hide need not be bothered about or afraid of surveillance, even as the State of Telangana batted for citizens’ right to privacy, emphasising that even the President of India cannot direct anyone to be put under illegal snooping.
The State reminded the court of its own nine-judge Bench judgment upholding privacy as part of the fundamental right to life under the Constitution.
The top court, the sentinel on the qui vive of fundamental rights, which includes the right to privacy, justified that citizens lived in an “open world”, indicating that those with clear hearts and minds need not be scared of snooping.
The State defended that the question involved was not about an “open or closed world”, but the basic right to be protected against illegal surveillance by the state machinery.
The debate in the court room between the Bench, headed by Justice B.V. Nagarathna, and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for Telangana along with senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, occurred during a hearing in the Telangana phone-tapping case.
“The question is can it [illegal surveillance] be done? The question here is not whether a person is ‘bothered’ or whether he has something to hide,” Mr. Mehta submitted.
The State had sought an extension of the police custody of former Telangana Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) chief T. Prabhakar Rao, who is an accused in the snooping phone-tapping case during the previous BRS government in the State.
“Now we live in an open world. Nobody is in a closed world. Nobody should be really bothered about surveillance. Why should anyone be bothered about surveillance unless they have something to hide?” Justice Nagarathna questioned.
Mr. Mehta asked whether the court was saying if “every government will have a free hand in putting people under surveillance”. He said illegal snooping by the government the Supreme Court was simply not permitted. It was plainly against the law.
“The Supreme Court knows the difference between an ‘open’ world and being under illegal surveillance. My personal communications with my wife… I have a right not to be under surveillance,” Mr. Mehta pointed out.
The top law officer referred to the court’s judgment in the Puttaswamy case, which had upheld privacy as integral to human dignity, liberty and autonomy, encompassing personal intimacies, family life, and sexual orientation.
Though acknowledging at one point that “ideally” surveillance should not be done, Justice Nagarathna’s oral remarks continued to focus on the logic that a person above board personally and professionally had nothing to conceal or feel guilty to fear from the state targeting them through snooping.
“Why should anyone be scared of surveillance? If you have nothing to hide, why should you be afraid?” Justice Nagarathna queried.
The prosecution case against Mr. Rao concerned an alleged conspiracy to “misuse” the resources of SIB for political purposes by putting citizens from different walks of life under surveillance. Those named as accused in the case had allegedly developed profiles of several persons without authorisation. They were accused of monitoring their subjects secretly and illegally, using the information gleaned from snooping in a partisan manner to favour a political party. The accused were also suspected of a conspiracy to destroy records and evidence of their crimes, according to police.
“This was an illegal surveillance without any authority of law under the guise that they were being monitored in connection with left-wing extremism. The information obtained through these illegal means included personal and medical records… This was profiling. It has to stop here. Thereafter they tried to destroy the data and evidence,” Mr. Mehta argued.
The court extended the police custody of Mr. Rao, who had surrendered, till December 25. The Bench directed that he should be released from custody thereafter since the case was pending in the Supreme Court.
The Bench ordered that no coercive steps should be taken against Mr. Rao till the next date of hearing in the top court, January 16, and he should cooperate with the probe when summoned.
Mr. Rao had surrendered before the investigating officer at the Jubilee Hills police station on December 12 on the directions of the top court. He had moved the top court challenging an order of the Telangana High Court which dismissed his plea seeking anticipatory bail.
Published - December 19, 2025 05:56 pm IST
