The nine-judge bench presided over by the Chief Justice of India (CJI), JS Khehar, has reserved the verdict in the right to privacy case after hearing arguments from the petitioners and the Centre over the course of six days. The final day of the hearing began with the Gujarat state counsel, Rakesh Dwivedi arguing against privacy as a fundamental right. The day ended with the petitioners’ rejoinders as the CJI pressed for the arguments to conclude Wednesday. The nine-judge bench included Justices DY Chandrachud, J Chelameswar, SK Kaul, SA Bobde, RF Nariman, AM Sapre, RK Agarwal and Abdul Nazeer besides the CJI.

So while we wait for the Supreme Court’s (SC) judgement on whether or not Indian citizens have the fundamental right to privacy, here are a few things that may concern you.

So, what next?

Speaking to Newslaundry, a SC lawyer who wished to be anonymous said that the Centre or the State mostly wins in such cases. For instance, the SC judgement in the PAN-Aadhaar linkage case, the courts gave partial relief to those without Aadhaar cards while making its linkage mandatory for those with the 12-digit unique identification (UID) number.

In this case, the nine-judge bench has reserved the judgement, which means that they will review pertinent information before pronouncing the verdict. Now, as we wait for the verdict, it is important to note is that the CJI retires on August 27 this year to be replaced by Justice Dipak Misra. So, does this mean the bench will have to pronounce its judgement before then? Rumours have it that the judgement will be announced in four weeks.

SC lawyer Karuna Nundy told Newslaundry that the bench would pronounce the verdict before the CJI’s retirement. “The bench that hears the case has to pronounce the judgement. The Chief Justice need not author it himself, but it is this nine-judge bench that will pronounce the judgement,” she said.

However, if the bench is unable to arrive at a consensus before the CJI’s retirement, there is a possibility of fresh hearings according to Delhi-based lawyer Satyajit Sarna.

However, since all the hearings in this case are over, the bench will not replace an existing member, which may have been the case if the arguments were pending post Khehar’s retirement.

Once the verdict is pronounced, the case will go back to the five-judge bench which also has Khehar, Chandrachud, Chelameswar, Bobde and Nazeer, who are also a part of the nine-judge bench. This bench will then decide the constitutional validity of the Aadhaar scheme and whether or not it violates a citizen’s right to privacy.

In so far as the Aadhaar case is concerned, the five-judge bench will be reconstituted to include the new CJI, Misra and there will be fresh hearings on the matter.

What does this mean for us?

While the SC court will deliver a verdict that will have a huge impact on everybody, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has constituted a 10-member committee to “deliberate on a data protection framework for India” on July 31. This committee headed by former SC judge, Justice BN Srikrishna also comprises the Chief Executive Officer of Unique Identification Authority of India, AB Pandey besides tech experts from IIT, IIM and Department of Telecom.

Here’s the notification from the MeitY.

As per the notification, the committee will begin its “deliberations” after the MeitY collects all the necessary information and hands it over to the committee within eight weeks. The composition of the committee has already got legal experts, journalists and tweeple talking.

The data protection bill which will be drafted by the 10-member committee will come up with recommendations which will be examined and discussed in the parliament. It will then become a law which could be subjected to constitutional challenge.

For instance, if the SC judgement holds that there is an absolute fundamental right to privacy that a citizen can exercise against the government and the data protection law holds that the restrictions on only private bodies accessing your data, then the law can be constitutionally challenged vis-a-vis the judgement.

However, Sarna told Newslaundry that “if the verdict says that citizens have no absolute right to privacy then the data protection bill will give citizens something they don’t have” whether it protects from private, public or both bodies. No matter the case, it would not be unfair to state that the verdict will have an impact on how the bill is drafted and perhaps even constitutionally challenged.

While the bill may take at least two months to be drafted, the judgement will determine whether privacy is a fundamental right or not. Though all the counsels arguing for and against privacy have held that privacy is important, there have been several arguments on whether it should be a common law right, fundamental right or a just a “sociological notion” as argued by Attorney General KK Venugopal.