Cow Slaughter continues despite Constitution Bench judgment of Supreme Court of India

Dear Friends, The Hon’ble Supreme Court of India (Constitution Bench of 7 Judges) way back on 26^th October 2005 in a detailed judgment in the case of State of Gujarat vs Mirzapur Moti Kureshi Kassab Jamat and Ors. had banned the cow slaughter.

Are you aware that Articles 48 and 48-A of the Constitution of India lays down directive principles for the State to save the cows. These read as under :

"48. Organisation of agriculture and animal husbandry.--The State shall endeavor to organise agriculture and animal husbandry on modern and scientific lines and shall, in particular, take steps for preserving and improving the breeds, and prohibiting the slaughter, of cows and calves and other milch and draught cattle.

48-A. Protection and improvement of environment and safeguarding of forests and wild life.--The State shall endeavor to protect and improve the environment and to safeguard the forests and wild life of the country.

Similarly, Article 51A of the Constitution of India lays down fundamental duty for every citizen of India to have compassion for living creatures. This article reads as under:

51-A. Fundamental duties.--It shall be the duty of every citizen of India--

(g) to protect and improve the natural environment including forests, lakes, rivers and wild life, and to have compassion for living creatures;"

However, sadly, the slaughter of our mother cow is still rampant in India. Cow is worshiped by many in India and it hurt our sentiments when the cow is slaughtered. Those who want to eat non-veg food have alternatives. Secularism and respect for other religions does not mean that Hindu values can be ignored or suppressed. The biggest problem is that people do not understand the meaning of the term "SECULAR" country. Secular exactly means a country which allows all the religions to be flourished without hurting sentiments of each other.

Every single State in India should ban cow slaughter.  Some State Governments have made laws to prevent cow slaughter but these are not being implemented. The remedy is that Central Government should make a central law for preventing cow slaughter which would be applicable throughout India and then to strictly implement and enforce this law.

In these ensuing Lok Sabha elections, let us impress upon and persuade our candidates to take a vow for passing a central legislation on prevention of cow slaughter.

The Constitution Bench judgment of Supreme Court can be accessed at following link :

https://www.dropbox.com/s/qwbisfkwt7xuqq6/State%20of%20Gujarat%20vs%20Mirzapur%20Moti%20Kureshi%20Kassab%20Jamat-SC-7Judges-26.10.2005-qureshi%20judgment%20on%20cow%20slaughter%20overruled.doc

Kindly circulate this post far and wide. 

Let us save our mother cow.

Sunil Goel advocate B.Sc. L.Lb L.Lm

Validity of ‘Aadhar card’ scheme of UIDAI under scrutiny of Supreme Court of India

The constitutional validity of the nationwide aadhar card scheme being implemented by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) at the instance of the Central Government headed by congress party is being scrutinised by the Supreme Court of India.

A PIL being WP (C) No.494/2012 titled as “Justice K.S.Puttaswamy (Retd) vs Union of India” was filed by retired Karnataka High Court Judge K.Puttaswamy in this regard. By way of an interim order passed on 23rd September 2013, the Supreme Court ruled that aadhar card can only be issued to those with proven Indian nationality and cannot be mandatory for accessing public services and subsidies. The Supreme Court held “In the meanwhile, no person should suffer for not getting the Adhaar card inspite of the fact that some authority had issued a circular making it mandatory and when any person applies to get the Adhaar Card voluntarily, it may be checked whether that person is entitled for it under the law and it should not be given to any illegal immigrant”.

On 26th November 2013, the Supreme Court sought responses of all states in two weeks on the constitutional validity of the aadhar card scheme being implemented by the UIDAI.  It is pertinent to note that UIDAI was not created by a statute but by a decision of an empowered group of ministers as part of the Planning Commission without any delegation of power to collect sensitive personal data in the shape of biometric details of citizens. The contention of PIL petitioner is that it is a serious legal and constitutional issue. The UIDAI does not have statutory existence. It enters into memorandum of understanding with the states, which do not have the sanctity of even a contract. The state in turn appoints registrars, who could either be a government official or a private person. The registrars engage private companies/organizations to collect sensitive biometric data without there being any statutory mechanism to protect this data from being commercially exploited by individuals. The Government says that the aadhar scheme is voluntary but the fact is that state governments make Aadhaar cards mandatory for registration of marriages, getting ration cards, registration of sale deeds, getting subsidized LPG cylinders, admission of students to schools and colleges, getting employees provident fund benefits and even grant of scholarships to students by the University Grants Commission. 

Sometime back, a Goa court directed UIDAI to give the CBI biometrics of all residents enrolled with Aadhaar in the state to help solve the gangrape of a seven-year-old girl. The court noted that the database, which includes recording of fingerprints, iris and facial images of applicants, was supposed to be devoid of duplication and tamper-proof. There were some chance fingerprints recovered from the scene of crime and the magistrate thought UIDAI could match these fingerprints with its database to help ascertain the identities of the assailants. Aggrieved by this order, the UIDAI moved Bombay High Court and argued that the validation of the magistrate’s order will open the floodgates of such directives by other courts as well other authorities. It added the UIDAI system was developed “for civilian use and for non-forensic purposes”. But the High Court recorded that the UIDAI had agreed to test the competence of its database in comparing the chance fingerprints found at the scene of crime with its biometric record and also asked the director general of the Central Forensic Science Laboratory to examine the technological capabilities of the UIDAI database. Terming the High court’s order as wrong and erroneous, the UIDAI, appealed to the Supreme Court by way of SLP (Crl) No(s).2524/2014.

The Supreme Court by way of its interim order passed on 24th March 2014 in the said appeal stayed Bombay High Court’s order. The Supreme Court also restrained UIDAI from transferring any biometric information of any person who  has  been allotted the Aadhaar number to any   other agency  without  his consent in writing. The Supreme Court further ruled that no person shall be deprived of any  service  for  want  of Aadhaar number in case he/she is otherwise eligible/entitled. The Supreme Court also directed all the authorities to modify their  forms/circulars/likes so as to not compulsorily require the Aadhaar number.

All the petitions challenging validity of aadhar card are tagged and are listed in Supreme Court of India on 28th April 2014.

Sunil Goel advocate 

B.Sc. L.Lb L.Lm