The Supreme Court, on Thursday, asked to be clarified about nature of safeguards put in place to prevent data theft and misuse. The court asked this while hearing arguments in the case that challenges the constitutional validity of Aadhaar, the 12-digit biometric identity number.
In response to senior advocate Shyam Divan, who argued that there is a "complete lack of integrity for the UIDAI", Justice D.Y. Chandrachud asked: "What were the nature of safeguards to ensure that the information was not purloined". The apex court was told that private agencies collected biometric data of the citizens under the Aadhaar scheme without any legal framework permitting it.
"There was no legal framework, none at all, backing the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) when it engaged private operators in the massive exercise of collecting citizens biometric data," Divan told the constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra.
He also told the constitution bench, also comprising Justice A.K. Sikri, Justice A.K. Khanwilkar, and Justice Ashok Bhushan, that rule of law was denuded to such a level that there was no governance and private operators for enrolling citizens under Aadhaar scheme were appointed without any legal framework.
Divan wondered that the citizens biometric data was being collected by the private operators without legal safeguards and there was no accountability of the central government, citing the government's statement in the parliament that 34,000 enrolment agencies were issuing fake cards and thereby polluting the whole exercise.
The hearing will continue on January 23.
