RS clears reform bill to link Aadhaar, Voter IDs
NEW DELHI: The Rajya Sabha on Tuesday approved a Bill that allows election officials to ask registered voters to provide Aadhaar details by voice vote amid a walkout by the Opposition.
The Election Laws (Amendment) Bill 2021 was passed in Lok Sabha on Monday barely hours after it was tabled by law minister Kiren Rijiju.
The bill proposes to allow Election Commission officials to seek Aadhaar details of registered voters on a voluntary basis and makes the language of the Representation of the People Act (RP Act), 1950, gender neutral.
The provisions related to the linking of the unique Aadhaar numbers with voter identity records was hotly debated by opposition MPs who said it was a violation of Supreme Court orders and a threat to privacy. The MPs have also said that it could eventually lead to mass disenfranchisement of voters.
The law minister has, however, contended that verification through Aadhaar will lead to the elimination of bogus voting.
During the session on Tuesday, opposition parties demanded a division of votes as they had moved a motion to send the Bill to a select committee, which was rejected by voice vote.
Trinamool Congress member Derek O’Brien cited rules for a division of votes even as deputy chairman Harivansh urged members to go to their seats to enable the division.
However, opposition members continued to raise slogans in the well. O’Brien threw the rule book on the table where officials sit and staged a walkout, an action strongly condemned by the ruling party members.
Derek O’Brien was suspended for remaining part of Winter session for hurling rule book in House later in the day.
Members of Congress, TMC, Left parties, DMK and NCP also staged walked out from the House in protest.
Members of BJP, JD(U), YSRCP, AIADMK, BJD and TMC-M supported the Bill, saying it will help in eradicating duplicate and fake voters from electoral rolls.
Terming the Bill “very good”, Rijiju said the legislation will help end fake and bogus voting in the country and make the electoral process credible.
Dismissing the Opposition’s apprehensions about the Bill as “baseless”, the minister said the Opposition was “misinterpreting” the Supreme Court’s judgment on personal liberty.
“There is no basis of your opposition to the Bill. The Elec
tion Commission and the government have held many meetings and the EC’s biggest concern is that the same person has (his or her) name in multiple electoral rolls and there is no other system to check this,” Rijiju said.
“In our democracy, the electoral process should be clean and that can happen only if the electoral rolls are clean. This Bill will be opposed only by those who take advantage of fake voting. Otherwise, there is no basis for opposing this Bill,” he said.
The Bill proposes an amendment of Section 23 of the RP Act, allowing the linking of electoral roll data with the Aadhaar ecosystem to “curb the menace of multiple enrollment of the same person in different places”.
In 2015, the Election Commission of India undertook pilot projects to use Aadhaar data to remove duplication and fake entries from electoral rolls before the Supreme Court struck down the exercise.
In the 2017 Puttaswamy judgment, the top court enumerated only certain areas – mostly subsidies – for which Aadhaar could be made mandatory.
The government in 2019 amended the Aadhaar Act, allowing for the 12-digit identity number to be used for more utilities and services.
The issue has been controversial with civil society and opposition parties flagging implications on privacy and potential voter profiling.
The Bill, however, makes a provision that no application for inclusion of name in the electoral roll “shall be denied and no entries in the electoral roll shall be deleted for inability of an individual to furnish or intimate Aadhaar number due to such sufficient cause as may be prescribed, provided that such individual may be allowed to furnish such other alternate documents as may be prescribed”.
The Bill further proposes a change to clause (b) of section 14 of the RP Act 1950, allowing voters to register four times a year, instead of just once.
The new dates for registration will be January 1, April 1, July 1 and October 1.
By amending section 20 of the RP Act 1950 and section 60 of the RP Act 1951, the draft legislation calls for substitution of the word “wife” with the word “spouse”, making the statutes gender neutral.
It also seeks to enable the requisition of premises for the purpose of being polling stations, counting, storage of ballot boxes, voting machines and poll related materials by proposing a change to section 160 of the RP Act, 1951.
The Bill also explains the power of delegated legislation with the government, which will allow it to formulate rules regarding the new provisions.
Digital rights groups including the Association for Democratic Reforms, the People’s Union for Civil Liberties and the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), have criticised the legislation.
IFF trustee Apar Gupta said, “The introduction and passage in the Lok Sabha today prevented Opposition MPs from even proposing amendments or engaging in meaningful debate.”