Deadline to Link Aadhaar to Services May be Extended to March 2018

The government may be open to extending the December 2017 Aadhaar-linking deadline, but for those without Aadhaar.

The SC was hearing arguments on whether to defer hearing the case on constitutionality of Aadhaar

(Photo: Liju Joseph/The Quint)

The central government has indicated that it may be willing to extend the deadline for linking Aadhaar to various private services, such as bank accounts, as well as public services, like welfare schemes, from 31 December 2017 to 31 March 2018.

The government proposal to extend the deadline, conveyed through its Attorney General to the Supreme Court, is for people who have not yet enrolled for Aadhaar.

The government will clarify their stance on extensions for people who have already enrolled for Aadhaar on Monday, 30 October.

Mentioning Before Supreme Court to Decide Date for Aadhaar Hearing

Following the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment on the right to privacy, a five-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court is expected to hear the case challenging the constitutionality of the Aadhaar scheme in November this year.

Also Watch: How Will Aadhaar Be Affected by SC’s Right to Privacy Verdict?

The date for these proceedings had not yet been set, as a result of which the Attorney General asked for a ‘mentioning’, to make some submissions regarding when the case should happen. Mentionings are normally used to ask for a date to be set urgently, but in this case, the AG was asking for the case to be deferred till after the central government prepared a data protection law.

An expert committee has been formed to draft this data protection law, which was mentioned in the right to privacy judgment as an important aspect of privacy that the government needed to address.

The current deadline for linking Aadhaar to services like bank accounts is 31 December 2017. And since the committee is not expected to have drafted its law before this date, the AG submitted that the government would extend the deadline for people who did not yet have Aadhaar to 31 March 2018.

Also Read: But Mr Prasad, I AM Forced to Link Aadhaar to These Facilities

Objections to Government’s Proposals

The petitioners in the case, who have been arguing that the Aadhaar scheme is unconstitutional, objected to both proposals by the government. Shyam Divan, Meenakshi Arora, Arvind Datar and Anand Grover (who argued in the Right to Privacy case as well) made the following arguments:

• First, they argued against deferring the case any further, as the matter was one of urgency, affecting crucial things such as whether children could sit for CBSE exams. They highlighted that the case had been going on for several years now, and how in that time Aadhaar was constantly being expanded to new services, sometimes in violation of the Supreme Court’s own 2015 interim order.
• Second, they argued that if the case was to be deferred, the deadline for linking Aadhaar to services needed to be extended for everyone, including those people who already had Aadhaar. Alternatively, the government would need to provide assurances that no coercive action would be taken against those who did not link Aadhaar to services till March 2018.

When the Chief Justice of India asked the AG if such an assurance could be given, the AG responded that they were happy to have the hearing on the case in November. On the matter of assurances, and extension of the deadline, he then said he would return on 30 October – when this issue will be discussed again – with the government’s instructions regarding people who already have Aadhaar.

Also Read: Deadline for Aadhaar to Avail Govt Benefits Extended to 31 Dec

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