Supreme Court has extended the deadline for linking Aadhaar card to march 31

The Supreme Court has extended the deadline for linking Aadhaar to banking services, telephone or mobile phone connections till the time it announces a verdict on the issue. The Supreme Court also noted that the Aadhaar Card would only be necessary for social welfare schemes and not other consumer services such as a getting a mobile phone connection.

A five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra and comprising justices AK Sikri, AM Khanwilkar, DY Chandrachud and Ashok Bhushan is hearing a case relating to the constitutional validity of the government's Aadhaar scheme.

On 7 March, the Supreme Court directed the CBSE not to make Aadhaar number mandatory for enrolment of students appearing in NEET 2018 and other all India exams. The order



came after CBSE decided to seek the Aadhaar number or Aadhaar enrolment number from students aspiring to take up the NEET 2018 examination.

On 15 December, the apex court extended till 31 March the deadline for mandatory linking of Aadhaar with various services and welfare schemes.

On 22 February, former Karnataka High Court judge Justice KS Puttaswamy told the apex court several deaths reportedly occurred due to starvation on account of glitches in the Aadhaar-based public distribution system and the court must consider granting them compensation.

Earlier, the top court observed that the alleged defect of citizens' biometric details under the Aadhaar scheme being collected without any law could be cured by subsequently bringing a statute.