On Friday, Jan. 4, Lok Sabha passed the #AadhaarAmendmentsBill with very little debate and scrutiny. We hope that the Rajya Sabha will offer more resistance to the Bill. We demand that Parliament review, rethink, and rework this awful Bill.
#RejectAadhaarAmendmentBill
We have previously listed a number of concerns with the #AadhaarAmendmentsBill, which can be read here:
rethinkaadhaar.in/blog/2019/1/1/…
We are also alarmed by the government misleading Parliament, both on the Bill itself and on the purported savings resulting from linking Aadhaar to various schemes. IT Minister RS Prasad has claimed that the Amendments are in compliance with the SC whereas they can SC orders.
The SC upheld the use of Aadhaar only for welfare schemes covered by Section 7 of the Aadhaar Act. To comply, the govt should have stipulated alternate & viable means of identification. Instead the Bill leaves this to unspecified regulations, in effect doing nothing for the poor.
Per the SC, the use of Aadhaar by private entities is prohibited. Using "voluntary" and "consent" as a cover does not make it right (to quote #UshaRamanathan). Offline verification and authentication are only a convoluted way of letting private entities continue using Aadhaar!
The govt has also misled Parliament on #Aadhaar savings. Read this thread for a full rebuttal of the claim that Aadhaar linking has saved INR 90,000 crore. #RejectAadhaarAmendmentBill
See also this thread on the role of the World Bank in perpetuating the claims of Aadhaar savings
We demand that Rajya Sabha immediately send the bill for a legislative review by a Select Committee. At the very minimum, Rajya Sabha must send the Bill back to the Lok Sabha will amendments that will ensure actual compliance with the SC judgment.
#RejectAadhaarAmendmentBill
Also read:
UPDATE: The #AadhaarAmendmentsBill was on today's Supplementary List, but Rajya Sabha was adjourned before the Bill could be discussed. This is now likely to happen tomorrow. Request all to push the issue for another 24 hours and take this chance to #RejectAadhaarAmendmentBill
We also urge #RajyaSabha MPs to demand a full investigation into the role of iSpirt in shaping #AadhaarAmendmentsBill
and suspend any discussion of the Bill until the investigation report is tabled in Parliament.
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