CHANDIGARH: Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s dream project, Parivar Pahchan Patra, prepared through the newly-carved Citizen Resources Information Department (CRID) has come under the judicial lens after a petition seeking its quashing was filed in the Punjab and Haryana high court.
Financial data of every family residing in the state would be with the state government and there is a high risk of the abuse of the database of Parivar Pahchan Patra by the ruling political party for its political gains, according to the petition.
The model of Parivar Pahchan Patra and its mandatory nature for availing essential services is arbitrary and makes a deep cut on the fabric of the fundamental rights enshrined under the Constitution, the petition added.
The matter reached the HC in the wake of a petition filed by Aditya Gupta, a Gurgaon resident, who sought directions to quash the notification dated April 22, 2020, and subsequent notifications related to the project, for being “illegal and unconstitutional.” The Khattar government had set up CRID through a government notification to collect crucial data of all the residents of the state of Haryana.
No statute has been enacted by the Haryana legislature to create, establish and empower such a crucial department which is about to collect, own and share personal social and financial data of around 15 million individuals/residents constituting around 5.5 million families along with the non-residents who are working in Haryana with any private or government entity, according to the petition.
The petitioner also stated that the Haryana government has made Aadhar number mandatory to get enrolled for the Parivar Pahchan Patra, despite the fact that the Aadhar card itself cannot be made mandatory.
“The state is trying to impose the mandate of Aadhar enrolment illegally, illogically and un-proportionally by making the Aadhar enrolment mandatory for the Parivar Pahchan Patra and then making the latter necessary to avail any and every basic service in the state of Haryana,” the petition stated.
The petition has been accepted for hearing by the HC registry and expected to come up for hearing next week.
What is Parivar Pahchan Patra?Haryana’s Citizen Resources Information Department (CRID) was set up on April 22, 2020 to create, implement and regulate family identification number aka Parivar Pahchan Patra for all families residing permanently or temporarily in the state It was aimed at the implementation of various schemes, involving recurring expenditure from the Consolidated Fund of Haryana Parivar Pahchan Patra was made mandatory to avail any services, including a number of basic fundamental services.
These include new water or sewer connections or to lodge a complaint about existing water/sewer connection or for the restoration of water supply or to apply for a new electricity connection or even for billing or meter complaints about the existing connections Basic services provided by police like character certificate, an application for lost property, registration of change of address or registration of change of mobile number or even an application for RTI request have been made entirely dependent on the Parivar Pahchan Patra Even the statutory mandates under the Domestic Violence Act, 2005 or under the Code of Criminal Procedure have been kept at bay while making the Parivar Pahchan Patra mandatory for women to avail of emergency assistance and protection in case of domestic violence or to seek relief and rehabilitation for a victim of acid attack