Indian Constitution Reinforces The Right To Be Forgotten

X v. The Registrar General, High Court of Karnataka & Ors.

The relevance of the right to be forgotten in cyberspace is being extensively addressed by courts in India. Through a simple online search, users now have access to the judgments of the Constitutional Courts through their websites and other third-party intermediaries.

In addition, publishers and the e-Courts website of Indian Courts have also started to provide access to judgments, decrees and orders of the District Judiciary and other trial courts.

This has led to litigants approaching the courts to seek redaction or deletion of their names or personal data from judgments.

Facts

In Writ Petition No. 25557 of 2023 before the Hon'ble High Court of Karnataka, the petitioner sought to conceal his name in the digital records of the court on the grounds that whenever the name of the petitioner was put into a search engine, it revealed that he had been accused of a crime although he had been acquitted.