In a new book, a lawyer argues that there is no consent-based model of data protection in India

Most people you ask will tell you that modern privacy law originated with an article called “The Right to Privacy’ written by Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis and published in the Harvard Law Review. It has been called the “most influential law review article of all time” and has affected the development of privacy law around the world. Roscoe Pound went so far as to remark that it did “nothing less than add a chapter to our law”.

It featured prominently in the Right to Privacy judgment issued by nine judges of the Supreme Court of India in Puttaswamy vs Union of India, being mentioned by four of the five judges who wrote opinions. In his lead opinion, Justice DY Chandrachud, while recognising the shortcomings of using comparative legal and historical frameworks to establish Indian law, could not help but acknowledge its influence in articulating the notion that the right to privacy is an embodiment of the basic need of every individual to live with dignity.

When they wrote their article in 1890, Warren and Brandeis were young lawyers setting out to make a name for themselves and their eponymous law firm. They were both incredibly smart men who had graduated first and second in their...

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