Supreme Court hearing on Aadhaar, voter ID linkage today

New Delhi: The controversial law linking Aadhaar and voter Identity Card has been challenged in the Supreme Court, with Congress's Randeep Singh Surjewala demanding that it be scrapped. In his petition, Surjewala has called the law "unconstitutional" and a violation of the rights to privacy and equality. The top court will hear the case on Monday.

The project to link Aadhaar with electoral data was started by theElection Commission as part of the electoral reforms process. The idea was to stop multiple entries in electoral rolls and make them error-free. The Election Laws (Amendment) Bill allows electoral registration officers to seek the Aadhaar number of people who want to register as voters "for the purpose of establishing identity".

The Union government has contended that it is meant to remove fake voters by stopping people from registering their names on the electoral rolls in multiple states. The Opposition has argued that allowing the Aadhaar-voter ID link could lead to more non-citizens voting in the country.