CPI(M) MP John Brittas warns that mandatory pre-installation of the Sanchar Saathi app threatens privacy rights and creates a potential surveillance system. Opposition leaders demand debate in Parliament, raising serious constitutional concerns over digital monitoring and user consent.
In a sharp critique of the Union Government’s latest digital policy directive, CPI(M) Rajya Sabha MP Dr. John Brittas has raised serious constitutional, privacy-related and civil-liberties concerns over the decision to mandate the pre-installation of the ‘Sanchar Saathi’ cybersecurity application on all new smartphones in India.
In a detailed letter addressed to the Minister of Communications, Jyotiraditya M. Scindia, Dr. Brittas warned that compulsory pre-installation—regardless of whether users are later allowed to uninstall the app—undermines the core democratic principle of informed and voluntary digital consent. According to him, embedding any application by force effectively transforms the smartphone into a potential tool of ongoing, opaque digital supervision.
Dr. Brittas questioned the logic behind the Government’s insistence on making the app a mandatory part of every new device if its usage is meant to be optional. He stressed that millions of mobile phone users, particularly senior citizens and digitally inexperienced individuals, are incapable of uninstalling system or pre-loaded applications. As a result, the app may remain permanently active for a large section of the population, not by choice but by default.
He further highlighted the widespread apprehension among citizens and digital-rights experts that background data collection may begin the moment the app is pre-installed, potentially continuing even after the user believes they have removed it. These concerns, he noted, deepen the fear that India may be drifting toward a technologically enabled, persistent surveillance ecosystem.
The CPI(M) parliamentarian stressed that the mandatory pre-installation must also be viewed in conjunction with the Government’s recent proposal for perpetual SIM-to-device binding for messaging applications such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal, Snapchat and others. He argued that, taken together, these measures could lay the foundation for a real-time, nationwide digital traceability grid capable of tracking communication patterns, social networks and mobility of ordinary citizens with unprecedented precision.
Dr. Brittas reminded the Government of the Supreme Court’s landmark 2017 judgment in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy vs Union of India, which firmly established the right to privacy as intrinsic to life and personal liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution. Any State action infringing upon this right, the judgment held, must pass the tests of legality, necessity and proportionality.
Drawing attention to a previous episode that raised alarm in political circles, Dr. Brittas recalled the 2023 incident in which numerous elected representatives, journalists and constitutional authorities received system warnings from Apple indicating possible state-sponsored hacking attempts. Brittas stated that despite repeatedly raising the matter in Parliament and requesting only the status and findings of the investigation reportedly referred to CERT-In, his questions were consistently disallowed under the justification that the matter was “secret in nature.”
He noted that Parliament and the public remain completely uninformed even today about whether the probe was completed, and if so, what findings emerged. When even Parliament is not permitted to access post-investigation reports in cases tied closely to fundamental rights and potential State overreach, Brittas argued, it becomes extremely difficult for citizens to place trust in assurances that new digital monitoring mechanisms will not be misused.
The controversy has also triggered sharp reactions from opposition parties. Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra criticized the mandate, asserting that every citizen must retain the right to communicate freely without fear of government surveillance. “Everyone must have the right to privacy to send messages to family and friends without the government looking at everything,” she said.
Congress MP Renuka Chowdhury submitted an adjournment motion notice in the Rajya Sabha, seeking suspension of business to debate the Government’s directive on Sanchar Saathi’s pre-installation. Senior Congress leader K.C. Venugopal also reiterated that the right to privacy is an essential component of the fundamental right to life and liberty.
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As debates intensify in Parliament and among digital-rights groups, the issue is expected to remain at the forefront of national discussions on civil liberties, surveillance, and the constitutional limits of government oversight in the digital era.
