Judge who challenged Aadhar scheme and fought for 'Right To Privacy'; former Karnataka High Court Justice KS Puttaswamy passes at 98

BENGALURU: Former Karnataka High Court judge Justice KS Puttaswamy passed away on Monday at his residence in Bengaluru. He was 98 years old. Puttaswamy's legal battle challenging the constitutional validity of the Central government's Aadhaar scheme was widely discussed. It was on his petition that the Supreme Court ruled that privacy is a fundamental right.

Puttaswamy was appointed as a judge of the Karnataka High Court on November 28, 1977. He remained in office until his retirement in 1986. Puttaswamy fought the legal battle against the Central government's Aadhaar scheme in 2012, at the age of 86. The fight was that the project was implemented only through an executive order and not legislation. Following this, the Supreme Court made an important observation that the right to privacy falls under the category of the right to life and personal liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution. However, the court had refused to quash Aadhaar scheme.

Puttaswamy was born in February 1926 in a village near Bengaluru. He completed his education at Mysuru Maharaja's College and Bangalore Law College. He was the government's attorney general in the high court after enrolling as a lawyer in 1952.

In 1986, he was appointed as the first Vice-Chairman of the Central Administrative Tribunal. He was later appointed as the Chairman of the Andhra Pradesh Administrative Tribunal in Hyderabad.