A public interest litigation (PIL) petition asking the Madras High Court to order a private hospital to provide a detailed report on the health of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on Tuesday introduced a new twist to the ongoing mystery about who was actually running the state in her absence and raised questions about how much the privacy of a public person could be breached.

That the PIL was admitted at all, as the relationship between a hospital and a patient is subject to confidentiality, is surprising. Even more surprising was the direction by the court to Tamil Nadu’s Additional Advocate General to “get instructions’ on the CM’s health on the grounds that the people of the state were anxious to know about the CM’s health.