SC refuses interim order on Centre’s Aadhaar notification

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to ask the government to not insist on the Aadhaar card for social welfare schemes while saying there was no proof that people who didn’t have the identification number were being denied benefits.

A vacation bench of justice A M Khanwilkar and justice Navin Sinha said no interim order could be passed on the “mere apprehension” of petitioners that government could deprive people from availing benefits due to lack of Aadhaar.

The court was responding to a petition that challenged the government’s February 8 and June 22 notifications extending the deadline for enrolling in the world’s biggest biometric identification programme.

The government had in February set June 30 as the last day to get the 12-digit unique identity number but eight days before it was to lapse, the deadline was extended to September 30.

Additional solicitor general Tushar Mehta told the court the Centre has extended the June 30 deadline to September 30 for those beneficiaries who didn’t have Aadhaar.

Senior advocate Shyam Diwan told the court that the government’s June 22 notification would hit children hard and deprive them of the mid-day meal, the world’s biggest school lunch programme. “We cannot pass orders on mere apprehension,” the court said.

Mehta said the government had identified 10 identity documents for disbursal of benefits under the various social welfare schemes. The court, which asked the government to file an affidavit in support of Mehta’s claim by July 4, will now hear the case on July 7.

Union antitrust regulators hit Alphabet unit Google with a record 2.42-billioneuro ($2.7 billion) fine on Tuesday, for illegally favouring its own online shopping service in its search results. The move indicates the European regulators will likely take a tough line with the Silicon Valley giant in two other ongoing cases.

The European Commission said the world’s most popular internet search engine has 90 days to stop favouring its own shopping service or face a further penalty of up to 5% of Alphabet’s average daily global turnover.

The commission found Google systematically giving its own comparison shopping service prominent placement in search results, demoting those of rivals.

“What Google has done is illegal under EU antitrust rules,” European Competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager said in a statement.