Maharashtra may frame law to make aadhaar must for state schemes

MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government is going to pass a law in the next few days that would make it mandatory for the state's residents to quote an Aadhar number if they want to enjoy the benefits of the various schemes of the government.

The move is significant given that the Supreme Court had reiterated in its earlier orders, as well as in 2015, that Aadhar cannot be made mandatory for people who want to avail of government schemes. However, the Maharashtra government, after consulting many legal experts, has worked a way around the Supreme Court order by saying that it would not deny any of its residents benefits accrued to him or her if they don't have an Aadhar card.

“The SC or der says no one would be deprived of Aadhar benefits if they don't have it... what we are saying is that we would not deny any services and would give the person witho ut an Aadhar card three months to join the scheme. But he would be able to avail of the benefits meantime by giving other ID proofs such as ration card or voter ID card,“ explained a senior government official. However, government officials also said that once all the arrangements are made and if the person still backs out after that, then that person's eligibility for any government scheme would be reconsidered.

The official said the government's role wouldn't be restricted to just giving a person a deadline to enrol into Aadhar.“We would go the whole hog and would facilitate his enrolment into Aadhar -everything from making arrangements for clicking his photo to getting him enrolled will be done by us,“ said the official. Maharashtra government officials said that they are insisting on the need for Aadhar to weed out many dubious beneficiaries who are cheating the state of crores of rupees every year.