In the absence of a dedicated law on facial recognition technology, how can India balance law-and-order imperatives with civil liberties?

Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) is deployed by Indian police without any FRT-specific statute, resting instead on general policing powers. With the Supreme Court now examining the "proportionality" of Delhi Police's use of a Facial Recognition System during the July 2026 NEET-UG protests [1], the task is not to choose between security and liberty but to build safeguards that serve both.

The law-and-order case for FRT

• Investigative efficiency: the Automated Facial Recognition System, approved for implementation by the NCRB, is meant to identify criminals, missing children and unidentified bodies, with access restricted to law-enforcement agencies [2].
• Legitimate state aim: Puttaswamy (2017) itself recognises crime prevention and investigation as valid grounds for limiting privacy [3].
• Delhi Police has defended its use as being in "legitimate state interest", to identify hardened criminals rather than ordinary citizens [1].

The civil-liberties concerns

• No enabling statute: absent a specific law, the "legality" limb of the Puttaswamy triple test — legality, legitimate aim, proportionality — is weakest [3].
• Chilling effect on Article 19(1)(b) freedom of assembly if protesters fear identification [1].
• Data governance gap: petitioners allege FRS data is retained by private entities, raising purpose-limitation and storage-limitation questions under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 [4].
• Accuracy and bias: misidentification risks fall disproportionately on minorities and marginalised groups.

Balancing framework

• Legislative anchor: a dedicated statute defining permissible purposes, thresholds of use, and retention periods.
• Proportionality by design: restrict FRT to serious offences; use least-intrusive means first.
• Independent oversight: prior authorisation, audit trails, and grievance redress under a data protection authority.
• Transparency: published SOPs, accuracy audits, and no outsourcing of biometric storage to unaccountable private vendors.

Technology need not be the adversary of liberty. A narrowly-drawn law, judicially supervised and aligned with the Puttaswamy proportionality standard, can let India harness FRT for public safety while keeping the constitutional promise of dignity and privacy intact.