'Aadhaar Act is Unconstitutional': The Fiery Dissent of Justice D.Y. Chandrachud
New Delhi: While the four judges out of a five-justice bench have upheld the Aadhaar project and the Aadhaar Act as constitutionally valid, dismissing most privacy and welfare exclusion concerns, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud’s dissenting opinion goes sharply in the other way.
“Constitutional guarantees cannot be compromised by vicissitudes of technology,” he noted in open court, in what is an emphatic dissent from the majority.
While a dissenting judgement has no force of law, it leaves open the possibility of being referred to a larger bench at a later stage.
Justice Chandrachud’s dissent starts from the legislative process that kick-started the Aadhaar Act, 2016. While the majority view expressed through Justice Sikri’s opinion indicated that there was nothing wrong in present and pushing the Aadhaar Act through Parliament as a money bill, Chandrachud has called it a “fraud on the Constitution”.
“The passing Aadhaar Act as money bill is a fraud on the constitution,” he said, while adding that the decision made by the Lok Sabha speaker to classify it as a money bill could be subject to judicial review.
While Chandrachud held the purpose of the Aadhaar Act to be legitimate, he differed from the majority opinion in noting that there are not enough robust safeguards as to “informed consent and individual rights such as opt-out”.
He also crucially disagreed with the majority opinion on whether Aadhaar minimised data collection and if it laid the ground for mass-profiling by noting that it had the “potential for surveillance” and that its architecture “posed risk on potential violation of leakage of database”.
“The data must all the time vest with the individual,” he said. Allowing private players to use Aadhaar will lead to profiling, which could be used to ascertain the political views of citizens, the judge, who pronounced his separate verdict, said.
He also held that denial of social welfare measures was violation of fundamental rights of citizens.
There is no institutional responsibility of the UIDAI to protect the data of citizens, he said, adding that there was absence of a regulatory mechanism to provide robust data protection.
However, he said it was now impossible to live in India without Aadhaar but it was violative of Article 14. If Aadhaar is seeded with every database, then there is chance of infringement of right to privacy, he said.
Justice Chandrachud said while parliament possesses the right to make a law, the absence of protection leads to violation of various rights.
State subsidies
While Justice Sikri’s opinion largely upholds Section 7 of the Aadhaar Act, which makes the biometric authentication programme mandatory for obtaining state subsidies, Chandrachud has sharply differed.
“Mandating Aadhaar for benefits and services under Section 7 would lead to a situation in which citizens will not be able to live without Aadhaar,” he stated, while rapping the Central government for making it mandatory for several schemes despite the Supreme Court noting in 2015 that it was to be purely voluntary.
Noting that mobile phone has become an important feature of life and its seeding with Aadhaar posed a grave threat to privacy, liberty, autonomy, he favoured deletion of consumers’ Aadhaar data by the mobile service providers.
Maintaining that the Prevention of Money Laundering Act Rules proceeded on assumption that every bank account holder is a money launderer, he said the assumption that every individual who opens a bank account is a potential terrorist or a launderer is “draconian”, he said.
courtesy : thewire.in
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'Last rites' of INDIA bloc: BJP on Cong-DMK fallout in Tamil Nadu
New Delhi (PTI): The BJP on Wednesday took a swipe at the Congress for extending support to Vijay's TVK in forming the government in Tamil Nadu and breaking away from its long term ally DMK, saying the party has a history of "betraying" its allies.
The saffron party also attacked the opposition INDIA bloc, claiming the alliance is "falling apart like a pack of cards" and lacks any common ideology or vision.
The Tamil Nadu Congress has decided to support TVK leader Vijay in forming a secular government in the state, sources said.
The decision to support the TVK was taken at an urgent meeting of the Political Affairs Committee (PAC) of Tamil Nadu Congress late on Tuesday night.
Reacting to the development, BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla claimed the INDIA alliance had effectively come to an end after the declaration of assembly election results on May 4.
"There is nobody whom the Congress has not deceived. Imagine what they will do to the Samajwadi Party if they have done this to the DMK," he wrote in a post on X.
Calling it the "last rites" of the INDIA bloc, Poonawalla, in a video post, said, "It has become a Bharat free of the DMK, TMC and the Left, and now Congress has dumped the DMK for the TVK."
The BJP spokesperson alleged that the opposition bloc was formed solely out of political compulsions and personal ambitions.
"The INDI alliance never had any mission or vision. It was only about ambition for position, corruption, commission and obsession against Modi ji that they came together. But now it is all falling apart like a pack of cards," he said.
Questioning the unity of the opposition parties, Poonawalla said the alliance was absent in several states during the election.
"Where was the INDI alliance in Bengal, in Kerala, in Gujarat, in Punjab, in Delhi, in Haryana, in Karnataka? There is no INDI alliance," he said.
The DMK on Wednesday described the Congress move to extend support to TVK as a "backstab" by its long-time national ally.
Speaking to PTI videos, DMK spokesperson Saravanan Anadurai said, "The Congress party has decided to ally with the TVK, pledging their support to the party. I think they have backstabbed... They have backstabbed the people of Tamil Nadu. They've backstabbed the mandate given by the people of Tamil Nadu."
He said that the decision came even before the electoral process had fully concluded.
"Even before the ink on the returning officer's signature on the victory certificate dried up, they've chosen to go ahead with an alliance," he said.
Vijay's TVK won 108 seats in the 234-member Tamil Nadu Assembly, falling short of the halfway mark. He needs the support of 10 MLAs to form a government with a simple majority. The results were declared only on Monday.
The Congress has won five seats, while the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) has bagged four seats. The CPI and CPI-M have two seats each. The outgoing ruling party, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), has won 59 seats while the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) has won 47 seats.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has won only one seat, and so have the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK) and the Amma Makkal Munnettra Kazagam (AMMK), while the VCK has won two seats.
The Congress had fought the assembly polls in a pre-poll alliance with the DMK, while the BJP had a tie-up with the AIADMK.
