Right to know parentage can trump privacy, rules SC

NEw new delhi: tin a adult male’s correct to concealment defeat a child’s lifelong search for the identity of his father? The Supreme Court answered that question by directing a DNA test and holding that courts must balance both interests, particularly where paternity lies at the heart of the dispute and no other evidence can provide a definitive answer.A bench of justices Sanjay Karol and N Kotiswar Singh, on Friday, dismissed an appeal by a man resisting a DNA examination and upheld an order directing genetic testing to determine whether he was the biological father of the claimant born in 1999.Balancing competing rights, the court said that the case involved not merely the privacy concerns of the alleged father but also the claimant’s lifelong quest for certainty about his identity.“As far as the right of privacy is concerned, we are balancing, in this case, (the man’s) privacy with the respondent’s (claimant’s) desire for closure on a question that has loomed large on his life throughout,” held the bench.The court noted that the claimant grew up watching his mother consistently assert that the appellant was his father, while official authorities repeatedly reached contrary conclusions.“If no positive answer is ever found out to the question, it is quite possible that the claimant would forever be denied the rights he may otherwise be entitled to by virtue of being the appellant’s son,” stated the judgment.The dispute arose from a civil suit filed by the claimant seeking a declaration regarding his paternity. According to the judgment, the alleged relationship between his mother and the appellant dated back to January 1999, while the claimant was born in September that year. The appellant consistently denied being his father. The court noted that there was no suggestion that the claimant’s mother had an intimate relationship with anyone else during the relevant period.The Supreme Court underlined that the question of paternity was not a collateral issue but lay at the heart of the litigation itself.Unlike cases where paternity is only incidental to the dispute, the present suit was instituted specifically to determine whether the appellant was the claimant’s biological father. Since the issue was directly in question and there was no alternative evidence capable of providing a categorical answer, the court found a DNA test necessary.The judgment revisited a series of recent rulings governing DNA testing in family disputes and reiterated that such tests cannot be ordered routinely.The court referred to its earlier decisions laying down that DNA profiling should ordinarily be directed only in exceptional cases where the controversy cannot be resolved through conventional evidence and where the test becomes indispensable for arriving at the truth.It also cited the principles laid down in Aparna Ajinkya Firodia Vs Ajinkya Arun Firodia (2024) and Ivan Rathinam Vs Milan Joseph (2025), which require courts to balance privacy, dignity and social consequences against a child’s legitimate interest in knowing their biological parentage.Quoting from the Ivan Rathinam ruling, the bench reiterated that courts must assess both the insufficiency of available evidence and the balance of competing interests before directing a DNA test.Applying those principles, the bench concluded that the balance decisively favoured the claimant. “The balance of interests definitely lies in favour of the respondent,” held the court while dismissing the appeal.The court then directed the trial court to fix a date for conducting the DNA test and thereafter proceed with the civil suit in accordance with the outcome of the examination.END