DC | 12th Feb 2013
Hyderabad: The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Monday asked a question everyone across the country wants an answer to. The court sought to know the rationale for linking supply of gas cylinders to the Aadhaar card.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice P.C. Ghose and Justice Vilas V. Afzulpurkar was dealing with two public interest litigations.
One was by G. Bala Goud, resident of the city, challenging the action of the authorities in imposing the condition of linking Aadhaar cards to LPG cylinders by February 15, 2013. The other was by K.R. Vijay of Secunderabad seeking a direction to put in place a mechanism to issue the Aadhaar cards to all the citizens before integrating them with the process of delivery of civic services.
Justice Ghose asked Surya Satish, counsel for the civil supplies department, to explain the rationale in linking the Aadhaar with the supply of LPG cylinders. The counsel replied that it was not the decision of the state government and it was the decision of the Centre and oil marketing companies.
The bench issued notices to the secretary, Union ministry for petroleum and natural gas, oil marketing companies and the principal secretary to civil supplies department of the state, directing them to place all the relevant facts related to the issue within two weeks.
They contended that there was no necessity to make Aadhaar card mandatory for supply of cylinders as the government has already issued ration card and voter identity card. They said enrollment for Aadhaar card is still on across the state and so far only 30 per cent of a population has received the card and it was not proper link LPG with Aadhaar card. The extension of the February 15 deadline is also brought to the court’s notice.