'Stalking' fear on Aadhaar.... Aadhaar cards souldn't lead to "mass surveillance" -Supreme Court

TT, New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday said the government must address concerns that its aggressive push for Aadhaar cards wouldn't lead to "mass surveillance" and "stalking" and wondered why the Singapore model of individual chip cards couldn't be adopted in India too.

"In the name of security and securing things... you can't have a stalking culture," Chief Justice Dipak Misra told attorney-general K.K. Venugopal, while referring to submissions by some petitioners.

The constitution bench, which also included Justices A.K. Sikri, A.M. Khanwilkar, D.Y. Chandrachud and Ashok Bhushan, said the government must address apprehensions that "authentication and aggregation of data would lead to mass surveillance".

"Why do you want to store data when you only want the identity of the person to be established?" Justice Sikri asked before citing the example of Singapore.

In Singapore, the judge said, "for every citizen it is mandatory to have a unique identity but there it is in the form of individual chip-based cards".

The suggestion was that instead of storing the entire data in a common server, the government could have adopted chip-based technology that can be accessed only by individuals - as in debit/credit cards - through individual passwords.

The court's queries came on a day the Centre quoted Rajiv Gandhi, saying the late Prime Minister had stated that out of every Rs 100 spent in the country, only Rs 15 went towards poverty alleviation schemes, the rest being pocketed by officials and middlemen.

Venugopal, who commenced his arguments on Wednesday, said the Centre had come up with the Aadhaar scheme only to plug such loopholes and ensure that subsides directly reached the intended beneficiaries.

Justice Chandrachud wanted to know why the government was insisting on Aadhaar cards even from pensioners when there was little scope for misuse of pension benefits.

Venugopal said the government had received complaints of impersonation but the bench pointed out that there might be a large number of pensioners who are settled abroad with their children.

The attorney-general clarified that non-resident Indians could always produce alternative identity proofs.

Even persons physically incapacitated on account of diseases like leprosy or accidents can produce alternative identity proofs, Venugopal said.

Section 7 of the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and other Subsidies, benefits and services) Act, 2016, provides for production of alternative ID proofs in case a person does not have an Aadhaar card, he added.

Justice Chandrachud said: "You should ensure that people do not suffer. Suppose a person suffers from dementia and is 85 years old, where will that person go to get an Aadhaar card? These are not aberrations, but issues which you have to address."

The bench referred to a purported advisory the Union cabinet secretary had sent to all government departments last year asking them to ensure that no "financial exclusion" (subsidy benefits) takes place because of lack of Aadhaar cards.

"What is the mechanism to prevent such financial exclusion?" Justice Chandrachud asked.

Venugopal merely repeated that there were various alternative IDs people could furnish. The arguments would continue on Thursday.