Centre introduces Bill to link voter IDs with Aadhaar cards amid protests by oppositions

Four major reforms have been introduced by the Centre to "strengthen the electoral process, making it more inclusive, giving more power to the EC, and to weed out duplicates."

Just like PAN-Aadhaar linking, seeding of the Aadhaar card with one's voter ID or electoral card will now be allowed as a part of the reform.

Law Minister Kiren Rijiju introduced the bill even as MPs from the Congress, DMK and the Trinamool Congress protested in the Well of the House, shouting slogans against the government.

While DMK and Congress MPs were protesting against the arrest of 55 Tamil fishermen by the Sri Lankan navy, the TMC and some other Congress MPs demanded the sacking of Union Minister Ajay Mishra over his son’s involvement in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence incident.

“The Bill is outside the legislative competence of the House as it violates the limits on legislation set by the Supreme Court in its judgment (Puttaswamy vs Union of India),” Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said.
The Bill aims to “curb the menace of multiple enrolment of the same person in different places”, Rijiju clarified.

"Aadhar number will be used by ERO only to establish identity of person in electoral-roll on being authenticated by UIDAI, as Aadhar has biometric data and no other information included in it will be used. This complies with test of proportionality," he added.