Punjab and Haryana High Court has ruled that recording wife’s telephonic conversation without her knowledge amounts to infringement of her privacy. Justice Lisa Gill passed the order recently while hearing a petition filed by a woman who challenged a 2020 order passed by Bathinda family court.
According to the official reports, the family court had allowed the woman’s husband to prove a CD with recorded conversations between him and his wife, subject to its correctness. Justice Lisa Gill stated that recording of telephonic conversation of the wife without her awareness or knowledge is a clear-cut infringement of her privacy.
Justice Lisa Gill further added that it cannot be said or ascertained as to the circumstances in which the conversations were held, or the way response elicited by a person, who was recording the conversations, because it is evident that these conversations would necessarily have been recorded surreptitiously by one of the parties.
The couple, whose marriage was solemnised in 2009, have a daughter and the in 2017, the husband filed a divorce petition. During cross-examination, the husband moved an application in July 2019, seeking permission to submit supplementary affidavit with the CD and transcripts of conversations recorded in memory card or the mobile phone’s chip. Last year, the family court allowed the husband to prove the CD on condition of its correctness, but then the wife approached the high court.
