Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday attacked the Narendra Modi Government’s Aadhaar regime and BJP’s anti-Padmavati movement as two most hazardous pollutants which had a smogging effect on fundamental rights of the citizens of India.
Dismissing the Aadhaar regime as a manifestation of Tughlaqan mindset Banerjee said the Government had compromised on private information of Indians doing serious damage to right to privacy.
“We had read about how Muhammad-bin-Tughlaq had acted on a whimsical way by transferring his Capital (from Delhi to Devagiri) and forcing demonetisation on the economy causing hardships to millions of people. Now here we could see for ourselves how a similar blunder in the name of demonetisation and unplanned implementation of Aadhar have subjected the people of India to untold misery” — all to tag along the “whims and fancies of one person,” Banerjee said without making direct reference to the Prime Minister.
On people’s private information stored in Aadhar cards being leaked to strangers she said, “The situation has come to such a pass that everything from the conversation between husband and wife to the content of mother-daughter dialogue are becoming public.”
There was a need for personal identification for which there were Epic, PAN and other cards, she said adding, “even if the Aadhar card was limited for personal identification there was no problem but here they are linking your private information to the Net and making it public which is very dangerous” for the right to privacy.
On the anti-Padmavati movement she said it was a “calculated plan” of a particular political party to destroy freedom of expression and divide the people along sectarian lines.