In a belated move to confer legitimacy on the Aadhaar programme, carried out till now without any legislative provision, the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) introduced the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Bill, 2016. Questions and concerns on its contents apart, the fact that the government chose to define it as a money bill and thus ensure its passage as a law by only having to secure majority support in the lower house raises concerns that matter to the constitutional scheme. That successive regimes went about issuing unique identification (UID) numbers all these years—and claim that about 95% of the adult population have already been covered—raises questions of whether we remain a constitutional democracy.
Such a statement may sound extreme. But given the impunity with which union governments have gone about this massive project without parliamentary approval, what else can one infer but that of brazen disregard for constitutional mores.
Furthermore, in this instance, the Lok Sabha speaker’s decision, exercising powers under Article 110(3) of the Constitution to allow its introduction as a money bill is indeed faulty.
This time the government is doing what it attempted previously in 2015 but then backtracked. In last year’s Union Budget, it sneaked in a provision on the monetary policy committee
of the Reserve Bank of India in the Finance Bill 2015, a money bill. In the face of opposition, the government scrapped that provision after introduction of the bill. This time it hopes to
go further.
of the Reserve Bank of India in the Finance Bill 2015, a money bill. In the face of opposition, the government scrapped that provision after introduction of the bill. This time it hopes to
go further.
The decision is faulty not only by the spirit of the Constitution, it is even so by the letter of the law. Article 110(2), which shall form the basis for the speaker arriving at a decision on whether a bill is a money bill or not, was clearly overlooked by the current Speaker Sumitra Mahajan. To paraphrase, the provision holds that a bill shall not be deemed to be a money bill by reason only that it provides for augmenting revenue collection or disbursal of money or services. This, incidentally, is the argument raised by the government too, that Aadhaar will save money. But, the Aadhaar project has implications for the rights of citizens, including the right to privacy since the UID project, even according to its votaries, addresses concerns of national security.
The discourse hitherto on this has brought out two issues. One, to effect a paradigmatic shift from the “welfare” state paradigm to an “enabling” state. Two, that this project was initially conceived as a security requirement in the aftermath of the Kargil war by the then NDA government and this concept is indeed what is behind the 12-digit UID number; each individual is given a unique number which is stored in a centralised database linked to that individual’s demographic and biometric information. Anyone who has merely read the newspaper will know of the inordinate interest of the Ministry of Home Affairs and the various intelligence agencies in the Aadhaar card. Clearly, the Aadhaar project is not merely one about facilitating direct cash transfers but has implications for the constitutional guarantees of life and liberty, including the right to privacy.
It may be that this right is not absolute and that like all other fundamental rights, the citizen’s right to privacy may be restricted. Such an agreement, however, will have to be based on a harmonious interpretation of the law for which the arguments for and against imposing such a restriction will have to be debated. The forum for such a debate is Parliament, particularly in times like the present, when political consensus has been so fragmented. To keep the Rajya Sabha out through a veritable sleight of hand may appear politically expedient to the present government but is a dangerous precedent which weakens parliamentary democracy. For all these reasons and many more, the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Bill, 2016, should not have been treated as a money bill if the idea of India as a constitutional democracy is to be preserved.
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