Individual Human Rights and National Interests – Finding the Balance: the Case of India and Russia

Summary This paper advances the individual human rights perspective to the understanding of national security by viewing it from a comparative lens concerning India and Russia. The question that is explored is how to safeguard individual human rights and human security at the larger level from the unwarranted restrictions imposed under the garb of national security. Although in countries like India, the judiciary is supposed to hold governments to the high constitutional principles that might be violated in the name of unwarranted security threats. On the other hand, in countries like Russia, a tyrannical leader, that keeps firm hands-on power for decades, can ignore the courts and other institutions, dismiss the check-and-balances, and produce massive human rights violations. In this light, this article attempts to provide solutions to these comparative situations by securing the right of defense, redefining extraordinary powers with the state, and restricting the power of law enforcement agencies.