Supreme Court Seeks UP, Uttarakhand Reply On QR Code Order For Kanwar Yatra Route Eateries

The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued notices to the Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand governments on a plea challenging orders to eateries along the Kanwar Yatra route to display QR code stickers with details of the owners, with a specific focus on their religious identity.

A bench of Justice MM Sundresh and Justice N Kotiswar Singh granted a week's time to the state governments to file their replies and said it would continue hearing this matter on July 22.

Deputy Advocate-General Jatinder Kumar Sethi, appearing for the states, sought two weeks' time to file the reply, but this was opposed by senior advocate Shadan Farasat appearing for the petitioners. Farasat said the matter is time-sensitive as the yatra is scheduled to finish soon.

The last day of this year's Kanwar Yatra is July 23.

The fresh application before the top court today seeks a stay on all directions issued by both the UP and Uttarakhand governments mandating public disclosure of the owners of restaurants and eateries along the yatra route, as well as similar details about their employees.

The application argued the directions sought to circumvent an interim stay issued by the Supreme Court on forcing restaurant owners to reveal such personal details.

The court had ruled eateries could not be forced to display such information.

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The application said the UP and Uttarakhand governments had issued fresh directions this year mandating the display of QR codes with owners' details.

This, it was argued, forced people to reveal religious and caste identities on the pretext of 'lawful licence requirements'. It is also a breach of an individual's right to privacy, the application argued.

"The requisite license is a self-contained certificate that, although reveals the name of the owner, is displayed inside... equating this requirement to display a normal-sized license with the directive to display name of owner, manager, and other employees... or to not give eateries names which do not reflect religious identity of the owner are de hors the requirements."

The application also argued that 'vague and overbroad directives' by the state deliberately mixed up licensing requirements with the other unlawful demand - to display religious identity - and left scope for violent enforcement of a manifestly arbitrary demand by vigilantes and the police.

The applicants contended there is 'grave and imminent risk of irreparable injury to the fundamental rights of affected vendors' and sought an immediate stay by the top court. They also claimed the intent behind the direction is to cause religious profiling of the sellers along the pilgrim route.

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