Money Bill status paves way for smooth passage
The reason why the Union Government presented the Aadhar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Bill as a money Bill is obvious: It did not want the crucial legislation to hit a roadblock in the Rajya Sabha where opposition parties have struck a belligerent note on various matters. Clearly, the Government did not want to take chances with a legislation that it believes can revolutionise the subsidies sector — helping it target actual beneficiaries and weed out the fake ones, thereby saving hundreds of crores of rupees through leakages. The Opposition has expectedly cried foul over the Centre's decision and the rejection of the demand that the Bill be referred to a parliamentary panel for further deliberation.
Now that the lok Sabha has passed the Bill, it is only a matter of time before it gets legislated; the Rajya Sabha can discuss the issue and refer the money Bill back to the lower House with its suggestions but cannot block its passage. Union Minister for Finance Arun Jaitley has, of course, defended the Government decision to qualify the Aadhar Bill as a money Bill, saying that the Bill had direct implications on the use of Consolidated Fund of India by the Centre or the State. This debate will continue for some time to come, but the core issue is that, once legislated, the Aadhar Bill will be of great assistance in not only further effectively streamlining of targeted subsidies but also giving the process legal teeth.
Of course, reservations over privacy issues need to be taken care of. There is a real fear that that the personal data collected in the process of preparing the Aadhar cards could be accessed and misused by private organisations. Jaitley pointed out that targeted subsidies had already resulted in a saving to the Centre of Rs15,000 crore, and a pilot project had saved the States more than Rs2,300 crore. This is a good start, and there is no reason why the Aadhar framework should not be further strengthened. The Congress's outcry is perplexing since it was the one which conceived the Aadhar scheme when it was in power as head of the UPA regime, and it should have been in the forefront in backing the Government's effort to take it to the next logical level: A legal cover. But the Congress had been behaving on the Aadhar issue in a manner similar to what it has adopted over yet another of its initiatives, the Goods and Services Tax Bill. The Modi Government has not been able to move ahead on the latter because it involves a constitutional amendment (the Rajya Sabha, dominated by the Opposition, has to be on board).
It would be wrong to say that the Government has slighted the Rajya Sabha by seeking to sideline it on the Aadhar Bill. It is for the opposition parties to reflect on whether it's proper of them to use their numerical strength in the upper House to disrupt people-centric policies and programmes of a ruling party that has been mandated by the people of the country to govern.