In a big setback to the Centre, the Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to give a ruling on the Narendra Modi government's high-pitched and public interest-laced plea to allow citizens to voluntarily use Aadhaar cards to avail benefits under all social welfare schemes.
This means, the apex court's August 11 interim order limiting the use of Aadhaar cards to access subsidy on LPG cylinders and ration under public distribution system holds good.
A bench of Justices J Chelameswar, S A Bobde and C Nagappan in its brief order said since petitions challenging the constitutional validity of Aadhaar cards have been referred to a five-judge Constitution bench, it would be better that the same bench takes a decision on applications filed by the Centre and other bodies seeking modification of the August 11 order.
Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi said the Centre would mention the issue before the chief justice on Thursday itself seeking an early decision on its applications on universal use of Aadhaar on a voluntary basis.
The Centre had made an impassioned plea before the SC on Tuesday for modification of the August 11 order, saying limiting its use was violating the rights of more than 50 crore of the 90 crore Aadhaar card holders. It said people were being denied the option of a single-window Aadhaar identification mode to get benefits under various welfare schemes.
The Centre's high decibel argument was followed by coordinated pleas from important institutions and statutory bodies like Reserve Bank of India, market regulator SEBI, insurance regulator IRDA, pension fund regulator and state governments - all seeking the SC's nod to use Aadhaar for establishing the identity of customers and consumers.
But it was opposed by petitioners on the ground that the biometric data of citizens stored in the Aadhaar card was not secured from potential misuse by outside agencies engaged by the government, thus endangering the right to privacy of citizens.
The SC had in its August 11 interim order said no one would be denied benefits under social welfare schemes for want of the 11-digit unique identification number. However, it had permitted the government to link PDS and LPG subsidies to the Aadhaar card to check possible pilferage.
The three-judge bench, headed by Justice Chelameswar, had referred the petitions challenging the validity of making Aadhaar card mandatory to a five-judge bench along with the question whether it violated right to privacy of a citizen. The court also added a critical question - whether right to privacy was part of citizen's fundamental right to life - after the Centre had cited eight-judge bench decisions that right to privacy was not a fundamental right.
Source : The Times of India
