AADHAAR RELATED ARTICLES: 11739 - AADHAR UNDER MY KURTA. by Avay Shukla

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, August 10, 2017

11739 - AADHAR UNDER MY KURTA. by Avay Shukla

Saturday, 5 August 2017

AADHAR UNDER MY KURTA.

As the Union government goes about linking the Ken and Betwa rivers in Madhya Pradesh I find myself doing a bit- actually, lots- of linking myself. These last few months have been exclusively devoted to linking various facets of my personal life into an ID trail for the benefit of the government's sleuths. It started with linking Aadhar to my gas connection, then to PAN card, Bank accounts. Income Tax returns, Cell phones, Pension account, CGHS card. Today I feel like I have more links than Dawood Ibrahim has to the underworld. And it keeps getting worse.

The other day I was having a hair-cut ( okay, a trim, since there isn't much hair left) at my barber's in Madhu Vihar and wondering at the injustice of having to pay more for a haircut every year even as the foliage keeps diminishing, when I came across another astounding piece of news. Apparently in Delhi you can no longer cremate a loved one unless you produce an Aadhar card to establish the identity of the deceased ! I guess it had to happen- having run out of living souls to harass, the govt. has now moved on to the dead. This may be the reason why the number of dead bodies being discovered hanging from trees or burnt in forests seem to be increasing- its more convenient ! And here we were blaming the poor innocent gau rakshaks for it! In the coming " acche din" dead bodies shall no longer be encased in burial shrouds but shall be bound in red tape, I fear. In any case, I'm taking no chances- when I've finally kicked the bucket decisively ( not just knocked it over, as I do every day to test the waters, as it were) I don't want the inevitable celebrations by my biological descendants marred by a search for my Aadhar card or awkward questions as to why my first name is spelt differently in Hindi and English by Spellcheck. I've stapled everything to my Will, which now looks like an Arunachal passport with stapled Chinese visas - driving licence, Aadhar, PAN, cell phone bill, Pension Payment order, the Bronze appreciation certificate issued by the IT Department (just before they rejected my refund claim), Voter ID card and a copy of my marriage photo-this last to prove that I've always looked like a thoughtful beagle and therefore my Aadhar card mug shot should not be doubted just on that score. And now I'm also considering uploading them all onto the Cloud.When I reach the pearly gates I don't want to find that Mr. Jaitley ( may his tribe increase) has preceded me and is insisting on their production before allowing me admission. Not that I realistically expect to make it to the pearly gates after thirty five years in the government- but you never know: maybe my dossier will be missing, just like the CCTV footage of Sunanda Pushkar's hotel floor or the Vyapam computer drives. I can get lucky too, you know!

On a more serious note, however, I wonder why the govt. is hellbent on this surveillance overdrive when it should be concentrating on creating jobs, improving investment and stopping the decline of the manufacturing sector, all of which are at historical lows, according to the latest CMIE report. Does it think we are a whole nation of crooks ? Some of us indeed are, and Mr. Jaitley knows who they are: corporate defaulters, Swiss bank account holders, the 440 names in the Panama papers, to mention just a few. Why doesn't he get after them instead of hounding the few who pay their income tax or have a couple of thousand in their Jan Dhan accounts ? Even Pakistan, a country we constantly ( and rightly, most of the time) deride has disqualified a Prime Minister on the basis of the Panama papers whereas we have put them into deep freeze. Mr. Modi has got his priorities completely wrong. Reforms are supposed to make the common man's life easier, but here we are being delivered one sledge-hammer blow after another: demonetisation, GST, Aadhar linking. "Ease of doing business" is alright, sir, but how about "Ease of Living"? Or dying?

One final thought, shared with me by an old friend. At a time when a chap cannot even consummate his marriage without producing his Aadhar card and verifying his biometrics, why is no one talking about linking Aadhar with the EPIC( Voter ID card)? Even the Election Commission acknowledges the huge problem of bogus voters, multiple EPICS for the same voter and impersonation. Won't the Aadhar linking obviate this evil once and for all? Why this conspiracy of silence on this issue by the government and the opposition ? Could it be that the status quo suits them all ? Think about it.

[ Author's note: Since I wrote this piece the Govt. has officially announced on 4th.August that Aadhar would be mandatory for obtaining death certificates. Something to finally die for! ]