Aadhaar to stay: Centre to Supreme Court
Centre had clearly told its own officers not to insist on Aadhaar cards
By : j. venkatesan
Update: 2015-07-22 04:03 GMT
New Delhi: Even as the Centre made it clear that there was no question of going back on Aadhaar card, the Supreme Court on Tuesday expressed serious concern over insistence by some of the states for Aadhaar cards to extend social welfare schemes and other services to citizens.
A three-judge Bench comprising Justices J. Chelameswar, S.A. Bobde and C. Nagappan drew the attention of Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi to the two earlier interim orders, restraining authorities from such mandatory insistence, until it decides the Constitutional validity of the same.
Justice Chelameswar told the A-G “Notwithstanding our interim orders some of the states are still insisting upon the cards, going by the newspaper reports. Even today in the morning I saw a newspaper that a very senior officer in a particular State had said that the card is mandatory, it is a very unfortunate situation.
The A-G said the Centre had clearly told its own officers not to insist on Aadhaar cards, but if States are doing it he would verify and revert back to the court. “I will ask the States not to do it, we will write to them. As far as we (Centre) are concerned, we are going strictly by the interim order, we have told them don’t insist.”