AADHAAR RELATED ARTICLES: 9102 - Why the United Kingdom scrapped its UID

In 2009, I became extremely concerned with the concept of Unique Identity for various reasons. Connected with many like minded highly educated people who were all concerned.

On 18th May 2010, I started this Blog to capture anything and everything I came across on the topic. This blog with its million hits is a testament to my concerns about loss of privacy and fear of the ID being misused and possible Criminal activities it could lead to.

In 2017 the Supreme Court of India gave its verdict after one of the longest hearings on any issue. I did my bit and appealed to the Supreme Court Judges too through an On Line Petition.

In 2019 the Aadhaar Legislation has been revised and passed by the two houses of the Parliament of India making it Legal. I am no Legal Eagle so my Opinion carries no weight except with people opposed to the very concept.

In 2019, this Blog now just captures on a Daily Basis list of Articles Published on anything to do with Aadhaar as obtained from Daily Google Searches and nothing more. Cannot burn the midnight candle any longer.

"In Matters of Conscience, the Law of Majority has no place"- Mahatma Gandhi

Ram Krishnaswamy

Sydney, Australia.

Aadhaar

The UIDAI has taken two successive governments in India and the entire world for a ride. It identifies nothing. It is not unique. The entire UID data has never been verified and audited. The UID cannot be used for governance, financial databases or anything. It’s use is the biggest threat to national security since independence. – Anupam Saraph 2018

When I opposed Aadhaar in 2010 , I was called a BJP stooge. In 2016 I am still opposing Aadhaar for the same reasons and I am told I am a Congress die hard. No one wants to see why I oppose Aadhaar as it is too difficult. Plus Aadhaar is FREE so why not get one ? Ram Krishnaswamy

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.-Mahatma Gandhi

In matters of conscience, the law of the majority has no place.Mahatma Gandhi

“The invasion of privacy is of no consequence because privacy is not a fundamental right and has no meaning under Article 21. The right to privacy is not a guaranteed under the constitution, because privacy is not a fundamental right.” Article 21 of the Indian constitution refers to the right to life and liberty -Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi

“There is merit in the complaints. You are unwittingly allowing snooping, harassment and commercial exploitation. The information about an individual obtained by the UIDAI while issuing an Aadhaar card shall not be used for any other purpose, save as above, except as may be directed by a court for the purpose of criminal investigation.”-A three judge bench headed by Justice J Chelameswar said in an interim order.

Legal scholar Usha Ramanathan describes UID as an inverse of sunshine laws like the Right to Information. While the RTI makes the state transparent to the citizen, the UID does the inverse: it makes the citizen transparent to the state, she says.

Good idea gone bad
I have written earlier that UID/Aadhaar was a poorly designed, unreliable and expensive solution to the really good idea of providing national identification for over a billion Indians. My petition contends that UID in its current form violates the right to privacy of a citizen, guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution. This is because sensitive biometric and demographic information of citizens are with enrolment agencies, registrars and sub-registrars who have no legal liability for any misuse of this data. This petition has opened up the larger discussion on privacy rights for Indians. The current Article 21 interpretation by the Supreme Court was done decades ago, before the advent of internet and today’s technology and all the new privacy challenges that have arisen as a consequence.

Rajeev Chandrasekhar, MP Rajya Sabha

“What is Aadhaar? There is enormous confusion. That Aadhaar will identify people who are entitled for subsidy. No. Aadhaar doesn’t determine who is eligible and who isn’t,” Jairam Ramesh

But Aadhaar has been mythologised during the previous government by its creators into some technology super force that will transform governance in a miraculous manner. I even read an article recently that compared Aadhaar to some revolution and quoted a 1930s historian, Will Durant.Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Rajya Sabha MP

“I know you will say that it is not mandatory. But, it is compulsorily mandatorily voluntary,” Jairam Ramesh, Rajya Saba April 2017.

August 24, 2017: The nine-judge Constitution Bench rules that right to privacy is “intrinsic to life and liberty”and is inherently protected under the various fundamental freedoms enshrined under Part III of the Indian Constitution

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the World; indeed it's the only thing that ever has"

“Arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say.” -Edward Snowden

In the Supreme Court, Meenakshi Arora, one of the senior counsel in the case, compared it to living under a general, perpetual, nation-wide criminal warrant.

Had never thought of it that way, but living in the Aadhaar universe is like living in a prison. All of us are treated like criminals with barely any rights or recourse and gatekeepers have absolute power on you and your life.

Announcing the launch of the # BreakAadhaarChainscampaign, culminating with events in multiple cities on 12th Jan. This is the last opportunity to make your voice heard before the Supreme Court hearings start on 17th Jan 2018. In collaboration with @no2uidand@rozi_roti.

UIDAI's security seems to be founded on four time tested pillars of security idiocy

1) Denial

2) Issue fiats and point finger

3) Shoot messenger

4) Bury head in sand.

God Save India

Thursday, December 3, 2015

9102 - Why the United Kingdom scrapped its UID - Anupam Saraph

Why the United Kingdom scrapped its UID

Anupam Saraph, Future Designer, Thought Leader

Published on Nov 25, 2015

Presentation made in June 2014 to explain David Cameroon's reasons for keeping his election
Published in: Government & Nonprofit
License: CC Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License

Why the United Kingdom scrapped its UID
1. Why the UK Scrapped its UID

2. UK destroys its Unique ID Program • Section 1(1) of the Identity Documents Act repealed the Identity Cards Act 2006 on 21 January 2011 (making all ID cards invalid) and mandated the destruction of all data on the National Identity Register by 21 February 2011. • The ID register was officially destroyed on Thursday the 10 February 2011 when the final 500 hard drives containing the register were shredded at RDC in Witham, Essex.

3. Increases Identity Theft • Placing trust in a single document may make identity theft easier, since only this document needs to be targeted.

4. Perpetuates Identity Denial • Tampering, forgery possible. • Failure of technology will deny identity.

5. Violates National Security • Extremely high risk of use of identity theft for organised crime and terrorism. • High risk to sleepwalk into a surveillance society and a 1984 dystopia.

6. Erodes Civil Liberty • Instead of the state being the servant to the citizen, it suddenly becomes the master. • Any breakdown in this register will mean that a whole series of services will collapse and your access to those services will collapse. • If it was… compulsory to carry your card everywhere you went – that you had to produce it upon request from a police officer who didn’t have to have any excuse to ask you – it’s a horrible vision -- but one could understand the ID cards having a real potency and a power.

7. Violates Human Rights Violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in particular: • Article 3: Right to life, liberty and security of person, • Article 6: Right to recognition everywhere, • Article 7: Right to equality, • Article 8-11: Right to Justice, • Article 12: Protection from arbitrary interference with privacy, family, home or correspondence, or to attacks upon honour and reputation, • Article 13: Freedom of movement and residence, • Article 15: Right to a nationality, • Article 17: Right to property, • Article 20: No one may be compelled to belong to an association, • Article 21: Right of equal access to public services, • Article 22: Right to social security, economic, social and cultural rights, • Article 26: Right to education, • Article 28: Right to social order in which these rights can be realized.

8. Encourages Feature Creep • Even without new primary legislation, the Identity Cards Act 2006 allowed the potential scope of the scheme to be much greater than that usually publicised by the Government.

9. Builds Discrimination • Nomads, homeless and the poor (such as Gypsies, travellers, asylum-seekers and refugees) risk being criminalized by failing to update their registration each time they move. • Significant concern among ethnic groups over how the Police would use their powers to cause abuse and discrimination.

10. Purposeless and Ineffective • Universal registers of personal information are very rarely effective as solutions to corruption and incompetence of the government.

11. Wastes Public Funds Needlessly • In 2005, an estimate from the Home Office placed the cost of a "standalone" ID card at £30. • In 2009, it was announced that retailers would be collecting fingerprints and photographs, and that they would be able to charge for this, meaning that the total cost for a standalone ID card was expected to be up to £60.

12. Is there a case for other UIDs to not be scrapped?

13. References • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_Cards_ Act_2006#Criticism • http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/ • http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/ election_2010/8678233.stm • http://identityproject.lse.ac.uk/camerontransc ript.htmRecommended