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Synopsis

Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain a plea filed by Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala challenging amendments to the Representation of People Act, 1950 which enables the linking of electoral roll data with the Aadhaar ecosystem purportedly to curb the menace of multiple enrolments of the same person in different places.

A bench of Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice AS Bopanna disposed of the plea while suggesting the petitioners move to the Delhi High Court.

The plea had submitted that the amendment, which allows linking of electoral roll with the Aadhaar ecosystem and providing private data of the voters to statutory authority, i.e., Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), fails to clear the test of proportionality, specifically the “Necessity Stage” and “Balancing Stage” of the Proportionality Test as laid down in Puttaswamy judgment.

It further added that the Impugned Amendment has been introduced to purportedly curb the menace of multiple enrolments of the same voter at several places. However, the Government without conducting any empirical study, without submitting any verifiable data in the public domain, and without elaborating on the exact numbers of voters who allegedly have multiple enrolments has introduced the amendment, which adversely affects millions of voters.

In this regard, the plea had sought the following directions:

1. Declaring that Section 4 and Section 5 of the Election Law (Amendment) Act, 2021 infringe upon the Fundamental Right of Privacy of citizens and therefore are unconstitutional and ultra vires the Constitution of India;

2. Pass appropriate writ, order or direction declaring that Section 4 and Section 5 of the Election Law (Amendment) Act, 2021 are violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India and the decision of top Court in K.S Puttaswamy v. Union of India.

Case Title: Randeep Singh Surjewala Vs. Union of India & Ors.