Indian Express: New Delhi: Tuesday, September 19, 2017.
Following the
Supreme Court ruling that states Right to Privacy as a fundamental right, the
law ministry has told the government to defer its plan to make submission of
Aadhaar details compulsory for corporate stakeholders in the e-business
register MCA21.
While
refusing to give a legal opinion “since the various provisions of the Aadhaar
Act were sub judice”, it advised the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) to
“await the final decision of the Supreme Court in this regard”.
It suggested
the postponement of mandatory linking of Aadhaar “to avoid any controversy
which may lead to embarrassment from the concerned quarters”.
The caution
came five days after a nine-judge constitution bench of the apex court ruled on
August 24 that privacy was intrinsic to freedom of life and personal liberty
guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution. The matter was referred by a
five-judge bench hearing a clutch of petitions challenging the Aadhaar Act.
In April, the
MCA posted on its website that it was “actively considering Aadhaar integration
for availing various MCA21 related services” and asked DIN holders, directors,
managerial personnel, company secretaries and chartered accountants to obtain
Aadhaar “as early as possible for integrating their details with MCA21”.
“When
implemented, all MCA21 services shall be available based on Aadhaar-based
authentication only. The date of Aadhaar integration with MCA21 would be
announced shortly …,” it said. The move was aimed to weed out bogus entities
and identify shell companies suspected to be used for laundering illicit funds.
However, five
months later, MCA developed cold feet following the realisation that Aadhaar
details on “MCA21” the public portal that serves as the registry for the
Registrar of Companies would be freely accessible to the public as the
Companies Act stipulates that any person can inspect these documents and obtain
their certified copies to submit as “evidence in Court of Law”.
The MCA asked
Legal Affairs Department to advise whether the personal information and
documents on the MCA21 could continue to be disclosed on the public platform in
spite of the Aadhaar and the Information Technology acts that do not allow
sharing of personal information of individuals with the public.
The second
query was whether it could term the Aadhaar number as “sensitive” data or
information to bar public access considering that the IT (Reasonable Security
Practices, Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules forbid
any information that is freely available or accessible in public domain or
furnished under the RTI Act to be termed as “sensitive”.
.JPG)
.JPG)
