New Delhi: The Supreme Court this morning ordered that the deadline for mobile phone-Aadhaar linking be extended from Feb. 6 to March 31.

The Court also fixed the final Constitution Bench hearing on Aadhaar for Jan. 17, 2018.

On the issue of linking bank accounts with Aadhaar, the Court said that existing Aadhaar card holders opening new bank accounts have to produce it before the bank. Non-Aadhaar card holders opening a bank account have time till March 31, 2018 to produce Aadhaar card. Meanwhile, Aadhaar enrolment slip would do.

A five-Judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court led by Chief Justice Dipak Misra had earlier agreed to the government’s suggestion to pass a judicial order extending the deadline.

Attorney-General K.K. Venugopal, for the government, submitted that the deadline for linking of “everything”, including bank accounts, with Aadhaar has already been extended from Dec. 31, 2017 to March 31, 2018.

In this regard, the government referred to a notification issued by the Ministry of Finance which had amended the proviso to Rule 9 (17) (a) of the Prevention of Money Laundering (Maintenance of Records) Rules of 2005 to remove the Dec. 31 deadline.  The notification also had substituted Rule 9 (17) (c) which said bank accounts would cease to operate if they were not linked with Aadhaar by Dec. 31.