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HomeIndiaGovernanceSupreme Court refuses to strike down Aadhaar but says private bodies can't...

Supreme Court refuses to strike down Aadhaar but says private bodies can’t insist on it

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Supreme Court strikes down a section of Aadhaar Act which allows mobile companies, banks and schools to demand Aadhaar. 

New Delhi: The Supreme Court Wednesday ruled in favour of Aadhaar, saying it didn’t violate the Indian Constitution.

The verdict put to rest a raging controversy over claims that compulsory enrolment for the unique national ID infringed on privacy.

But the bench struck down Section 57 of the Aadhaar Act, which allows not only the state but also any corporate or person or private entity to demand Aadhaar. Section 57 allowed mobile companies, banks, schools and private service providers to seek an individual’s Aadhaar card for identification.

The bench also ruled that bank accounts need not be linked to the Aadhaar number.

In the landmark judgment, the bench ruled that Aadhaar empowers marginalised sections of society by giving them a unique identity. It, however, also ordered that the Aadhaar Act must be amended to make it mandatory so that only an officer not below the rank of joint secretary could share data collected under the act.

The majority opinion penned by Justice A.K. Sikri ruled that there are “sufficient safeguards” in the UIDAI structure and the Centre had effectively argued that there was a valid legitimate aim behind Aadhar act.

The judgment comes almost six years after the first plea against the unique identification system was filed by retired high court judge K.S. Puttaswamy.

A five-judge bench, led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra and comprising justices A.K. Sikri, A.M. Khanwilkar, D.Y. Chandrachud and Ashok Bhushan, began hearing the matter on 17 January, and concluded almost four months later on 10 May. The arguments took place over 38 days.


Also read: God, please save India from our ‘wine ‘n cheese’ Aadhaarophobics


The case

While concluding his arguments in the case earlier this year, Attorney General K.K. Venugopal — who was representing the Narendra Modi government — observed that this was the second longest oral hearing in the apex court’s history.

The longest was in the landmark Kesavananda Bharati case in 1973, where the top court had outlined the basic structure of the Constitution and ruled that one could not tamper with it.

A battery of senior advocates made compelling arguments in the case — illustrious names like Gopal Subramanium, Shyam Divan, Kapil Sibal, P. Chidambaram, Arvind Datar, K.V. Vishvanathan, P.V. Surendranath, Rakesh Dwivedi and Meenakshi Arora were among those who appeared.

What the two sides said

In the course of the arguments, the government defended its move to make Aadhaar compulsory for a host of benefits and services as a welfare imperative. Aadhaar had also become mandatory for bank accounts, PAN cards, mobile phone services, passport and driving licence.

Also, the government submitted that Aadhaar would ensure the targeted delivery of aid to the proper beneficiaries, which would benefit millions and plug leaks.

The petitioners, however, alleged that Aadhaar was a breach of one’s fundamental right to privacy. They argued that the mammoth database of fingerprints and iris scans was vulnerable to breaches.

Court’s concerns

The top court’s primary concern lay over the alleged breach of privacy.
In August 2017, the court had declared privacy a fundamental right — a question which had often popped up during the Aadhaar hearings.


Also read: India’s landmark data privacy law won’t apply to the very cause behind its existence— Aadhaar


The apex court had also expressed its apprehension over the debate triggered by the controversy over data leaks, and the alleged illegal use of Facebook users’ data to sway the US elections.

“The real apprehension is the data available can influence the electoral outcome of a country… whether democracy can survive if Aadhaar data is used to influence the electoral outcome,” Justice Chandrachud had said.

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3 COMMENTS

  1. Hopefully, Justice Chandrachud’s minority view that recourse to the Money Bill route was wrong will serve as a note of caution. Like the Mauritius route, a lot of dodgy stuff has been getting through, with the Speaker playing along …

  2. The apex court has struck a fair balance. Indiscriminate recourse to Aadhaar – mobiles, bank accounts, etc – has been struck down. What should worry the government is that this programme is falling flat even on its most basic duty, viz, to prevent misuse or diversion under welfare / subsidy programmes such as the PDS. Recently, in a case from Uttar Pradesh, as many as 1.8 lac fraudulent transactions for diversion of food grains have come to light. It is also now clear that the data bases are easily hacked into.

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