Telecom companies are duping you into believing that phone numbers have to be linked with your Aadhaar number. According to several reports, many telecom service providers have been alerting their customers to link their mobile numbers with their Aadhaar numbers, citing a circular issued on March 23, 2017, by the Department of Telecom (DoT). This despite the fact that the Supreme Court has yet to pass an order on whether Aadhaar infringes upon the right to privacy.

What’s in the DoT circular?

According to Live Law, the DoT circular requires all telecom operators in India to conduct an Aadhaar-based re-verification exercise of all existing pre-paid and post-paid mobile connections, with a deadline of February 6, 2018. The circular, according to their report, cites an observation from a Supreme Court hearing about a writ petition filed by an NGO called Lokniti, seeking verification of identity and address of every mobile phone subscriber. The bench in its order agreed that mobile phones can be tools in both domestic criminal activities and terrorist activities and, therefore, each and every mobile user must perforce renew cards periodically.

The bench, in its order, said: “The petitioner approached this court for a commendable cause. Prayer in Writ petition is that there should be a definite mobile phone subscriber verification scheme to ensure 100 per cent verification of the subscribers. The prayer is that the identity of every subscriber and also his address shall be verified so that no fake or unverified phone subscriber can misuse the phone. The contention is that it is important as mobile phone is used for domestic criminal activities, but also for terrorist activities.”

Photo: Associated Press

“The attorney general [Mukul Rohatgi], in his endeavour to demonstrate the effectiveness of the procedure put in place says that application form will be required to be filled up by new mobile connection subscribers through the KYC process. This procedure, he says, is sufficient to alleviate the fears in the writ petition… Each prepaid card holder must perforce renew cards periodically. Ninety per cent of existing subscribers can also be verified by mechanism similar to the one adopted for new subscribers. The AG says that an effective mechanism will be put in place within one year as far as possible.”

According to another Live Law editorial by Gopal Krishna of the CFCL, the DoT’s letter on the subject of "Implementation of Hon’ble Supreme Court orders regarding 100 per cent E-KYC based re-verification of all existing subscribers" partially refers to the court’s order dated February 6.

The court’s observation in paragraph five reads, “In view of the factual position brought to our notice during the course of hearing, we are satisfied, that the prayers made in the writ petition have been substantially dealt with, and an effective process has been evolved to ensure identity verification, as well as, the addresses of all mobile phone subscribers for new subscribers. In the near future, and more particularly, within one year from today, a similar verification will be completed, in the case of existing subscribers.”

Why is this wrong?

Supreme Court advocate Chitranshul Sinha, in a Huffington Post piece, says, that the DoT calling this observation a "direction" which has to be complied with, is an erroneous conclusion drawn by the regulatory body, and is based on a misinterpretation of the order.

Sinha further adds, "There can be no question of Aadhaar being made mandatory for re-verification of existing users when it is not even mandatory for obtaining new connections. Therefore, the circular, by stating that the Supreme Court has directed the DoT to mandate Aadhaar as the exclusive method for re-verification, is misleading the public at large, intentionally or unintentionally."

The Live Law piece argues that attorney general Mukul Rohatgi did not inform the bench on February 6, that another three-judge bench of the Supreme Court had made enrolment of Aadhaar optional, and directed the government not to make it mandatory. Because the former Chief Justice Khehar and Justice Ramana were not part of either the three-judge bench, which issued the order on August 11, 2015, or the five-judge Constitution bench on October 15, 2015, which reiterated that order, one can presume that they were unaware of the relevance of those orders in light of this hearing. The piece further adds that it was the duty of the AG to inform the bench about its relevance, which he did not.

Right to privacy

The Supreme Court in August, in a 547-page landmark judgment on the right privacy case, snubbed the Centre and established privacy as a fundamental right, under Article 21 of the Constitution of India. The privacy verdict returns the power of data to the citizens themselves, as should be in a democratic republic and expands the ambit of fundamental rights, by firmly locating privacy within it.

This very fundamental right, at this moment, is being negated by the DoT, which is asking subscribers provide their Aadhaar card details, including biometric information, to telecom operators in what can clearly be seen as a misrepresentation of the court’s orders. But till this order is actually overturned by the judiciary, telecom operators will follow it.

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