The senior advocate said that putting Aadhaar to use had helped save Rs 33,000 crore, which was not being taxed earlier.
Seeding Aadhaar with PAN and bank accounts and other facilities would help authorities in effectively dealing with the global threat of money laundering, Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) told the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
Appearing for UIDAI, Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta told a five-judge Constitution bench of Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra that requiring people to link Aadhaar to various services does not mean that the “entire population is guilty”.
Stating that there is “no presumption of guilt”, Mehta said, “When you are applying a particular methodology to weed out people accused of financial crimes, etc in public interest, there is neither a presumption of guilt nor criminality on everybody.”
The ASG was countering arguments by the petitioners that insisting Aadhaar from everyone for everything makes people feel that all of them were doubted by the government.
The bench also comprises Justices A K Sikri, A M Khanwilkar, D Y Chandrachud and Ashok Bhushan.
Justice Chandrachud pointed out that the level of intrusion would vary from case to case and there cannot be any uniform threshold level for all instances.
Mehta replied this is “only an administrative measure”, and that “wherever there is a statutorily permitted intrusion, there is no presumption of guilt”. He added, “There is no stigma that the entire population will be treated as tax evaders” or money launderers.
The senior advocate said that putting Aadhaar to use had helped save Rs 33,000 crore, which was not being taxed earlier.
Mehta also said that banks are now mandated to verify identity of customers, and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) has become stringent since 2013. Justifying the seeding, he said, “It is meant to achieve a proper purpose like preventing money laundering…”