In a ruling that redraws the boundary between misconduct and criminal voyeurism, the Supreme Court has held that taking photos or videos of a woman—without consent—but not during a “private act” does not amount to voyeurism under Section 354C of the Indian Penal Code.
A bench led by Justices N Kotiswar Singh and Manmohan cleared a man accused of intimidation and intrusion of privacy, concluding that the allegations simply did not meet the legal threshold for voyeurism.
The case began in March 2020, when a woman reported that the man stopped her and her companions from entering a property and then recorded her without permission. The police booked him under Sections 341, 354C and 506, and later filed a chargesheet.
But the Court found the core offence missing.
The judges backed the earlier view taken by the Calcutta High Court: accusations of photography alone—even if unwelcome—do not trigger Section 354C unless the woman is engaged in a “private act” as defined in law.
And the law is precise. A “private act” includes moments where a person reasonably expects privacy—such as being unclothed, using a lavatory, or performing a sexual act. None of this, the Court noted, was alleged in the complaint or investigation materials.
Since the statutory ingredients weren’t satisfied, the Court refused to stretch the definition of voyeurism to cover conduct that, while improper, did not fit the language or intent of Section 354C.
With that, the appeal succeeded, and the criminal case stood dismissed.
