The Centre on Tuesday told the Supreme Court that it was willing to include the suggestions made by Trinamool Congress MLA Mahua Moitra in her plea against the Unique Identification Authority of India’s fresh bid for a social media wing to monitor people online, Live Law reported.
On September 7, the Supreme Court had said that the Aadhaar authority’s move to hire an agency to monitor various social media platforms was contrary to its submissions in the court. The court asked Attorney General of India KK Venugopal to assist it in the matter.
Mahua, in her plea, had said that the scope of the social media agency’s work cannot impinge upon the right to privacy, which the top court had upheld last year. The petition especially decried the proposal for a “social listening tool”, which it claimed was an attempt to “overreach the jurisdiction” of the top court, PTI reported.
Mahua also pointed out that the Centre sought to put the “entire surveillance architecture at the mercy of private persons employed on a contract basis”.
On Tuesday, advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, representing the petitioner, pointed out that the corrigendum to the second Request for Proposal for hiring a social media agency is unavailable on the UIDAI’s website. He added that none of the changes Moitra had suggested had been incorporated.
In response, Attorney General of India KK Venugopal agreed to file the Centre’s response after incorporating the changes.
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