The 2018 Constitution Bench judgment in Justice K. S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India did not give Aadhaar a clean bill of health. It struck down Section 57 of the Aadhaar Act, meaning private companies cannot demand Aadhaar, and held that Aadhaar may only be required for benefits and subsidies funded out of the Consolidated Fund of India. It also barred mandatory Aadhaar for school admission, board exams, mobile connections and bank accounts.
In practice, those limits have been worked around. Aadhaar continues to be demanded, formally or informally, for school enrolment, for new SIM cards, for opening accounts, for receiving scholarships and pensions, and now for a growing range of welfare and identity systems. The court’s narrowing has been treated by the executive as an inconvenience to route around, not a constitutional ceiling to respect.
The judgment is also internally divided. The majority accepted Aadhaar’s “minimal” architecture. Justice D. Y. Chandrachud’s dissent, which we view as the more accurate reading, found the entire scheme unconstitutional for the harms it inflicts on welfare entitlements and the surveillance architecture it enables. For the legal background, see the primers in our resources.