Aadhaar-Voter ID card linking: SC asks Surjewala to move Delhi High Court

New Delhi, July 25: The Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain a plea by Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala challenging the Election Law Amendment Act that enables linking electoral roll data with the Aadhaar ecosystem.

A bench of justices D Y Chandrachud and A S Bopanna asked the petitioner to move the High Court raising the challenge.

"Why don't you move the Delhi High Court?", the bench asked the counsel for the petitioner when the matter was taken.

The Congress leader, in his plea, submitted that the linking of the cards infringes upon the fundamental right of privacy of citizens and is unconstitutional and ultra vires the Constitution".

The law is a violation of the right of privacy and right to equality and is also unconstitutional, Surjewala said.

The bill which seeks to link electoral rolls with the Aadhaar ecosystem to weed out duplicacy.

The Election Laws (Amendment) Bill seeks to allow electoral registration officers to seek Aadhaar number of people who want to register as voters "for the purpose of establishing the identity".

It also seeks to allow the electoral registration officers to ask for Aadhaar number from "persons already included in the electoral roll for the purposes of authentication of entries in electoral roll, and to identify registration of name of the same person in the electoral roll of more than one constituency or more than once in the same constituency".

While the Centre has said that it helps to do away with "fake voters," the Opposition claim that it will allow non-citizens to vote in the country.

Apart from Congress, the DMK, NCP, TMC, and the BSP have opposed the new laws.