Delhi High Court Stays Mandatory Aadhaar Biometric Attendance Order for Public Prosecutors
Appearing for the prosecutors association, Senior Advocates N Hariharan, Ashish Mohan and Sachhin Puri along with advocates Kushal Kumar, Aditya Kapoor, Rishabh Saxena and Harsh Ahuja contended that the Prosecutors’ association had earlier approached the High Court challenging the validity of two attendance circulars.
On August 17, the Delhi High Court had directed the authorities to treat the petition as a representation and decide the issue within four weeks of granting a personal hearing to the association. The order also allowed the prosecutors association to come back to the Court if it remained aggrieved.
“The actual hearing took place only on September 15, after the stipulated time-period of 4 weeks was over.”
The prosecutors’ association also submitted that the Home Department rejected its representation through minutes dated September 30 without recording any reasons. It is further added that the minutes silence the members’ specific objection to the mandate of Aadhaar authentication.
Following the submissions, Justice Amit Mahajan stayed the October 5 order stating,
“It is hereby stayed till further orders.”
The order which mandates all prosecuting officers, working with the office of the Attorney General of India and Directorate of Prosecution Department makes it necessary to register themselves on and mark daily attendance through Aadhaar Enabled Biometric Attendance System (AEBAS) from October 12.
The prosecutors association had approached the Delhi High Court challenging the October 5 order issued by the Director of Prosecution making it mandatory for public prosecutors, additional public prosecutors and assistant public prosecutors to register themselves online.
The plea claimed that prosecuting officers attend courts on daily basis and are required to sign on the judicial order sheet. “Due to this new mandate, prosecuting officers will have to register twice a day once while reporting to office and second while reporting to court.”
The prosecutors association through its lawyers contended before the Delhi High Court that the October 5 order is illegal and violates the rights of the individual attorneys under Article 21 and Article 14 of the Constitution of India.
It was further argued that by introducing this mandate of Aadhaar based biometric attendance system infringes on the right to privacy of the attorneys. The October 5 order has been challenged on the grounds that it is arbitrary and violates several provisions of the Aadhaar Act, 2016.
