The Supreme Court on Friday recommended that a constitutional bench be set up to decide on all Aadhaar-related matters, PTI reported. A three-judge bench, headed by Justice J Chelameswar, asked the Centre and the petitioners in the case to urge the chief justice of India to set up the panel.
“We suggest both of you [petitioners and the Centre] request the Chief Justice to constitute a larger bench so that these matters can be decided finally,” said the court. Attorney General KK Venugopal and senior advocate Shyam Divan, who is representing the petitioners, said they would ask Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar to consider the request.
On June 27, a vacation bench had rejected a plea to pass an interim order against the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government’s notification to make Aadhaar mandatory when applying for social welfare scheme benefits.
The apex court was hearing three separate petitions challenging government’s notification making Aadhaar mandatory for availing benefits of various social welfare schemes. The top court, however, did impose a condition that those without Aadhaar cards could not be deprived of any government schemes or benefits till the next hearing in the case.
The Centre had made Aadhaar compulsory from July 1 for filing income tax-returns. For this, it said that the Aadhaar and Permanent Account Number must be linked, a decision that was upheld by the Supreme Court on June 9.
The Narendra Modi government also made it mandatory for bank account holders to link their accounts to Aadhaar. On June 16, the Centre announced that Aadhaar would also be compulsory for those who want open new bank accounts, and for transactions above Rs 50,000.
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