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IN THE

SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

CIVIL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION

WRIT PETITION (C) NO. 494 OF 2012

JUSTICE K.S. PUTTASWAMY (RETD) & ANR.

..PETITIONER(S)

VERSUS UNION OF INDIA & ORS.

.. RESPONDENT(S)

T.C.(C) No. 151/2013 T.C.(C) No. 152/2013 WRIT PETITION(C) No. 829/2013 WRIT PETITION(C) No. 833/2013 WRIT PETITION(C) No. 932/2013 TRANSFER PETITION(C) No. 312/2014 TRANSFER PETITION(C) No. 313/2014 WRIT PETITION(C) No. 37/2015 WRIT PETITION(C) No. 220/2015 TRANSFER PETITION(C) No. 921/2015 CONMT.PET.(C) No. 144/2014 In WRIT PETITION(C) No. 494/2012

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CONMT.PET.(C) No. 470/2015 In WRIT PETITION(C) No. 494/2012 SPECIAL LEAVE PETITION (CRL.) No. 2524/2014 CONMT.PET.(C) No. 674/2015 In WRIT PETITION(C) No. 829/2013 O R D E R 1.

This Bench is constituted only for the purpose

of deciding the applications filed by the Union of India seeking certain clarification/modification in the

orders

passed

by

a

Bench

of

three

learned

Judges of this Court dated 11.08.2015. 2.

We

have

heard

Shri

Mukul

Rohtagi,

learned

Attorney General for India, Shri Shyam Divan, Shri Soli Sorabjee and Shri Gopal Subramanium, learned senior counsels in extenso. 3.

After hearing the learned Attorney General for

India and other learned senior counsels, we are of the view that in paragraph 3 of the Order dated 11.08.2015, if we add, apart from the other two Schemes,

namely,

P.D.S.

Scheme

and

the

L.P.G.

Distribution Scheme, the Schemes like The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employement Guarantee Scheme

12

(MGNREGS), National Social Assistance Programme (Old Age Pensions, Widow Pensions, Disability Pensions) Prime

Minister's

Jan

Dhan

Yojana

(PMJDY)

and

Employees' Providend Fund Organisation (EPFO) for the

present,

it

would

passed by this Court.

not

dilute

earlier

order

Therefore, we now include the

aforesaid Schemes apart from the other two Schemes that this Court has permitted in its earlier order dated 11.08.2015. 4.

We impress upon the Union of India that it

shall strictly follow all the earlier orders passed by this Court commencing from 23.09.2013. 5.

We

Aadhaar

card

will

also

Scheme

is

make

it

purely

clear

that

voluntary

the

and

it

cannot be made mandatory till the matter is finally decided by this Court one way or the other.

6.

All

the

applications

for

intervention

and

impleadment be heard along with the respective main matters. 7.

Application(s)

for

modification/

clarification

filed by Union of India/UIDAI is/are disposed of.

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8.

Since there is some urgency in the matter,

we request the learned Chief Justice of India to constitute

a

Bench

for

final

hearing

of

these

matters at the earliest. Ordered accordingly.

...................CJI [ H.L. DATTU ] ...................J. [ M.Y. EQBAL ] ...................J. [ C. NAGAPPAN ] ...................J. [ ARUN MISHRA ] ...................J. [ AMITAVA ROY ] NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 15, 2015.

Supreme Court extends Aadhaar use to more schemes while saying it’s purely voluntary thehindu.com/news/national/aadhaar-purely-voluntary-says-supreme-court-but-extends-its-use-to-more-schemes/article7765893.ece

New Delhi October 16, 2015 00:28 IST Noting that the authorities cannot insist on a citizen to produce his Aadhaar card, the Supreme Court on Thursday extended the voluntary use of the card to the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), all types of pensions schemes, employee provident fund and the Prime Minister Jan Dhan Yojana. A Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice of India H.L. Dattu said use of the Aadhaar card was purely voluntary and not mandatory. With this, the Supreme Court modified an August 11 order issued by its three-judge Bench restricting Aadhaar use to only PDS and LPG (cooking gas) distribution. The Bench said the purely voluntary nature of the use of Aadhaar card to access public service will continue till the court takes a final decision on whether the Aadhaar scheme is an invasion on the right to privacy of the citizen. The interim order came after senior advocates Shyam Divan and Gopal Subramanium said the Aadhaar card scheme was neither backed by law nor administrative decree. “You have no document of authority, either from Parliament or administrative decision, to collect fingerprints of the citizenry,” Mr. Divan argued. “Give me 15 minutes. Your Lordships will be aghast and never share your biometrics or opt for Aadhaar,” Mr. Subramanium urged the Bench also comprising Justices M.Y. Iqbal, C.S. Nagappan, Arun Mishra and Amitava Roy. However, repeated statements separately drawn by the court on Wednesday from the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and various authorities, including the RBI, SEBI, TRAI, to name some who sought modification of the August 11 order that Aadhaar would be used “purely voluntarily” and not mandatorily won the day. Chief Justice Dattu had specifically asked Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for UIDAI, to make a statement in open court that “you will not insist till the matter is finally decided here or a legislation is introduced in Parliament”. “Suppose we decide that Aadhaar is purely voluntary and any attempt to make it mandatory would be treated as contempt of court... are you ready to give an assurance or make a statement here to this effect?” the CJI had asked Mr. Rohatgi, who replied in the affirmative on Wednesday. “No person will be denied benefits under any government scheme for want of Aadhaar card,” the A-G submitted.

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Supreme Court reminds govt: Aadhaar cannot be mandatory indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/supreme-court-reminds-govt-aadhaar-cannot-be-mandatory-3046983/

Written by Utkarsh Anand | New Delhi | Updated: September 23, 2016 10:57 pm Reminding the Central government that Aadhaar cannot be made mandatory for any services, the Supreme Court has ordered it to remove a condition making it mandatory for the students to give their Aadhaar numbers for various scholarship schemes. A bench led by Justice V Gopala Gowda recalled an order of the top court in October 2015 whereby it was clarified that “the Aadhaar card Scheme is purely voluntary and it cannot be made mandatory till the matter is finally decided by this Court one way or the other”. But a the letter dated sent by the Central government to chief secretaries and administrators of all states and union territories on July 14 had stated that only online application under the National Scholarship Scheme will be accepted and “it may be noted that submission of Aadhaar is mandatory.” Appearing for All Bengal Minority Students Council, senior lawyer Gopal Jain said that this communication was in contempt of the interim order passed by a Constitution Bench, which has repeatedly said that Aadhaar could not be made mandatory and nobody could be denied access to any service for lack of it. The bench accepted his submission and stayed the operation and implementation of Centre’s communication for Pre-Matric Scholarship Scheme, Post-Matric Scholarship Scheme and Merit-cum-Means Scholarship Scheme to the extent they made submission of Aadhaar mandatory. “We direct the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India to remove Aadhaar number as a mandatory condition for students’ registration form at the National Scholarship Portal…” further directed the court in a recent order. It has also sought an explanation from the Centre for including such a condition despite the five-judge bench’s restraint against making Aadhaar compulsory. © The Indian Express Online Media Pvt Ltd

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