Facts:

The issue arose when the Petitioner (Jacob Puliyel) who was a member of the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI) and was advising the Government of India on vaccines filed a Writ Petition in public interest asking the government to release the entire segregated trial data for each of the phases of trials that have been undertaken with respect to the vaccines being administered in India for COVID as he claimed there were some adverse effects due to it and to declare that vaccine mandates, in any manner whatsoever, even by way of making it a precondition for accessing any benefits or services, a violation of rights of citizens and hence unconstitutional.

The court held:

“Respect to the infringement of bodily integrity and personal autonomy of an individual considered in the light of vaccines and other public health measures introduced to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, we are of the opinion that bodily integrity is protected under Article 21 of the Constitution and no individual can be forced to be vaccinated. Further, personal autonomy of an individual, which is a recognised facet of the protections guaranteed under Article 21, encompasses the right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment in the sphere of individual health. However, in the interest of protection of communitarian health, the Government is entitled to regulate issues of public health concern by imposing certain limitations on individual rights, which are open to scrutiny by constitutional courts to assess whether such invasion into an individual’s right to personal autonomy and right to access means of livelihood meets the threefold requirement as laid down in K.S. Puttaswamy “ Concluding, even though no individual in the country could be forced to get vaccinated, the current vaccine policy in India could not be said to be unreasonable and manifested arbitrarily.