The Supreme Court on Monday questioned the working of its registry with regard to listing public interest litigations (PIL) for hearing more than a year after they were last heard in February last year.
“There is something very fishy going on in this court,” a bench of Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and Justices Joymalia Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi said while hearing a PIL on foreign credit companies collecting and storing confidential financial data of consumers without obtaining their consent. “The Registrar (Judicial) is directed to submit a report on why the matter should not be listed after February 2025.” This case is scheduled to be heard on April 10.
He ordered the matter to be listed for hearing on March 17 last year.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Union government, said on Monday that the matter requires a detailed hearing as the Home Ministry submitted its response to the PIL pending since 2024.
Prominent lawyer K. Parmeshwar, who assisted the court as amicus curiae, filed a memorandum based on the government’s response. The court asked Parmeshwar to share his memorandum with Mehta and gave the government two weeks to file a response.
The petition mentioned four foreign companies and accused them of collecting and processing confidential and sensitive financial data of consumers. It referred to five Indian companies and asked them for guidance to protect data privacy and secure financial information.
The petitioner, Surya Prakash, said the companies’ actions were prohibited under the Credit Information Companies Regulation Act, 2005. He said foreign companies were collecting data and storing it in their servers located outside India in violation of the principle of data localization without the knowledge of individuals and companies availing their services.
