When the Election Commission came out with an announcement for a new plastic voter ID card, Hari Menon was relieved. An engineer from Kochi working in Bengaluru, he had always wanted to change the photograph in his voter ID card which bore only a remote resemblance to his true self.
The day after the announcement came last month, he headed over to the Election Commission’s website ceo.kerala.gov.in
But he was in for disappointment.
There was no way he could get the new voter ID card without providing his Aadhaar number, for which he had not even applied.
“I had not applied for Aadhaar as the Supreme Court has clearly said that Aadhaar has not been made mandatory, and no one can be denied any service because that person does not have the card. I think this application form for the new voter ID card is a clear violation of that order,” says Mr. Menon.
The Supreme Court had in its order dated September 23, 2013, said, “In the meanwhile, no person should suffer for not getting the Aadhaar card inspite of the fact that some authority had issued a circular making it mandatory…”
In a second order on March 24, 2014, the court had said, “…no person shall be deprived of any service for want of Aadhaar number in case he/she is otherwise eligible/entitled. All the authorities are directed to modify their forms/circulars/likes so as to not compulsorily require the Aadhaar number in order to meet the requirement of the interim order passed by this Court forthwith.”
Earlier this year, on March 16, the Court further said that, “…In the meanwhile, it is brought to our notice that in certain quarters, Aadhaar identification is being insisted upon by the various authorities, we do not propose to go into the specific instances. Since Union of India is represented by learned Solicitor General and all the States are represented through their respective counsel, we expect that both the Union of India and States and all their functionaries should adhere to the Order passed by this Court on 23rd September, 2013.”
When contacted by The Hindu , Additional Chief Electoral Officer Sabu Paul Sebastian said that voters without Aadhaar cards will be able to get the new card in the next phase.
“The current drive is part of the National Electoral Drive Purification and Authentication Programme. Aadhaar seeding is being done to weed out duplicate records and purify the rolls. Aadhaar is not at all mandatory for voters. ,” he said.