The Right Against Self-Incrimination In The Digital Age: A Comparative Legal Analysis Of India And The United States
- IJLLR Journal
- Sep 19
- 1 min read
Annpurna, Research Scholar, School of Law and Governance, Central University of South Bihar, Gaya
ABSTRACT
One of the strongest safeguards of constitutional liberty is the right against self-incrimination, which protect individuals from being forced to give evidence again themselves. Originating from the rejection of the English Star Chamber's coercive methods in the seventeenth century, it has since been made constitutional in both India and the United States. No one shall “be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself,” according to the U.S. Fifth Amendment, while Article 20(3) of the Indian Constitution guarantees that “no person accused of any offence shall be forced to be a witness against himself.” The right against self-incrimination in India and the US is compared in this paper, with an emphasis on the difficulties brought about by the digital age. It explores the privilege's constitutional and historical underpinnings, looks at significant court rulings, such as Boyd, Miranda, Hubbell, and Riley in the United States and M.P. Sharma, Kathi Kalu Oghad, Selvi, and Puttaswamy in India, and assesses how legislatures and courts have modified the privilege to fit novel investigative situations. Particular focus is placed on areas where traditional testimonial-physical distinctions have not worked well, such as forced password disclosure, biometric authentication, and decryption of encrypted data.
Keywords: Self-incrimination, Digital age, Article 20(3), Fifth Amendment, Privacy rights
