Controversy brewing in Kerala over collection of CDRs of COVID-19 patients by police

Thiruvananthapuram, Aug 13 (PTI) A controversy is brewing
in Kerala over the decision to allow police to access phone
call detail records of COVID-19 patients for effective contact
tracing with opposition Congress on Thursday slamming the Left
government, saying it is an "infringement" on the privacy of
citizens.
"Police collecting phone details is an infringement on
the privacy of an individual, which is against the Supreme
Court's latest judgment in the K S Puttaswamy case," Leader
of the Opposition in the state assembly Ramesh Chennithala
said.
Speaking to reporters here, he said the opposition will
raise its voice against this and demand its immediate
withdrawal.
"We will not allow Kerala to be converted into a Police
State and health workers should take the lead in the fight
against COVID-19," he said.
As there were delays in sending the CDRs by telecom
operators in some places, the Additional Director General of
Police, Intelligence, had been entrusted to take up the matter
with BSNL and Vodafone, he claimed.
The government decided to use police help in containment
measures as coronavirus cases began spiralling in the state,
touching 38,144 on Wednesday.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said call detail
records (CDRs) were being used by police in the state as part
of adopting innovative and scientific methods for effective
contact tracing.
The details would not be used for any other purpose and
there would be no intrusion into the privacy of the patients,
he told the media yesterday, adding this was the "most
effective" way of contact tracing and the state had been using
this method for a few months.
Justice D Y Chandrachud, while delivering the main
judgment in August 2017 on behalf of Chief Justice J S
Khehar, Justices R K Agarwal and S Abdul Naeer, held that
privacy is intrinsic to life, liberty, freedom and dignity and
therefore, is an inalienable natural right.
Supreme court lawyer Kaleeswaram Raj felt if collection
of the phone details was in the best interest of patients,
that is permissible to that extent.
But police should ensure that there was no infringement
of privacy rights and larger community rights.
The judgment in the Puttaswamy case will require a
contextual application, he told PTI from Delhi.
In the judgment, the apex court had said that there is a
fundamental right to privacy.
But how far it is an enforceable right in a given case
will depend upon a particular situation, he noted.
Two state government circulars issued this month are also
adding to the confusion over COVID-19 data collection.
Chief Secretary Dr Vishwas Mehta had on August 3 stated
that all district collectors should have a daily interaction
with District Police Chief and the District Medical Officer to
ensure close coordination on COVID-19 issues.
"The Chief Minister has given all the field officials a
target of two weeks to contain COVID-19 pandemic in all the
districts.
In this regard, District Police Chiefs must provide
leadership to enforce strict home quarantine, contact tracing
and enforcingsocialdistancing norms," he said.
However, a circular by Dr A Jayathilak, Principal Revenue
Secretary, on August 8 issued guidelines stating that District
Disaster Management authorities were responsible for
collecting field level COVID-19 related data and sharing it
with Kerala State Disaster Management Authority (KSDMA).
The KSDMA is responsible for identification and
delineation of containment zones and micro containment zones
inconsultation with police department.
"The police are responsible only for enforcing the
restrictions imposed in containment and micro containment
zones. Before enforcing containment zone restrictions in a
locality advance notice has to be served to the public," it
said.
Earlier, the UDF had also attacked the government for
entrusting major responsibilities of COVID-19 containment such
as identification of containment zones, monitoring of those in
quarantine and contact tracing, from the health department to
police, saying this would create "police raj."
With COVID-19 cases continuing to rise, the Pinarayi
Vijayan led government early this month decided to bring
in stringent measures to contain the spread and had entrusted
police with the task of contact tracing and enforcing
quarantine protocols.
The Indian Medical Association has also flayed the
decision, saying this was a job of health workers. PTI UD
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(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)