‘Don’t bypass Rajya Sabha’
Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, a member of the five-judge Supreme Court bench on the Aadhaar issue, yesterday held that the Aadhaar Act cannot be treated as a money bill and passing it as one will be an act of fraud committed against the constitution.
“Aadhaar cannot be treated as a money bill and passing a bill as a money bill, which is not a money bill, is a fraud on the constitution,” he observed in a separate minority judgement.
Chandrachud said the decision of the Lok Sabha Speaker on whether a bill can be treated as a money bill can be subjected to judicial review.
“Aadhaar could not have been brought as a money bill. The Speaker cannot take away the powers of the Rajya Sabha, a creation of the Constitution. No power is absolute,” he said.
While agreeing with the majority on some points, Justice Chandrachud dissented on the main point about a money bill and the principle of proportionality of the applicability of Aadhaar.
“Absence of a regulatory and monitoring framework leaves the law ineffective in the protection of data.”
He also observed that there was a risk of surveillance of people on the basis of data collected under the Aadhaar scheme, noting that the data could be misused.
No need for data in SC/ST promotion quotas
The Supreme Court yesterday said the state does not have to collect quantifiable data on the backwardness of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (SC/ST) for the purpose of affording them reservation in promotion.
A five-judge Constitution Bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra gave this ruling after hearing the centre’s plea for reconsideration of its 2006 judgement that stipulated quantifiable data on the SCs/STs in such circumstances.
In its 2006 judgement in the Nagaraj case, the top court had said: “... [the] state will have to show in each case the existence of compelling reasons, namely backwardness, inadequacy of representation and overall administrative efficiency, before making provision for reservation in promotion.”
Making it clear that the concept of creamy layer within the SC/ST is not the issue, a bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justice Kurian Joseph, Justice Rohinton Fali Nariman, Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice Indu Malhotra had earlier said: “There may be individuals (within SC/ST) who might have overcome the stigma, but the community continues to face the stigma.”