Bibhu Ranjan Mishra / Bangalore September 23, 2010, 0:07 IST
Salarpuria Touchstone on the Marathalli-Sarajapur Outer Ring Road is no different from the thousands of commercial premises in Bangalore, with many of them occupied by technology firms, both Indian and global. But the first floor of the same building houses something special.
This is where Nandan Nilekani, chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), stashes away his top secret resources: the brains architecting the UID project. And the importance of the technology centre is evident from the security.
This is where Nandan Nilekani, chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), stashes away his top secret resources: the brains architecting the UID project. And the importance of the technology centre is evident from the security.
Silently, resolutely, ‘Aadhaar’ — as the UID project has now been christened — and Nilekani have succeeded in attracting some of the best and brightest that the IT world can offer, both from within India and from overseas. They include many who were once instrumental in incubating successful technology ventures or were part of large entities like IBM, HP or Intel. They have now joined UIDAI as volunteers.
Some of those said to be working in the building include Bala Parthasarathy, co-founder of online photo service company Snapfish (later acquired by HP); Sanjay Swamy, who until very recently was CEO of mobile-based payment service firm mChek; and Pramod Varma, formerly VP-Research & Chief Technology Architect of B2B service provider Sterling Commerce (now a part of IBM).
Some of those said to be working in the building include Bala Parthasarathy, co-founder of online photo service company Snapfish (later acquired by HP); Sanjay Swamy, who until very recently was CEO of mobile-based payment service firm mChek; and Pramod Varma, formerly VP-Research & Chief Technology Architect of B2B service provider Sterling Commerce (now a part of IBM).