Wednesday, December 1, 2010

897 - Member of Parliament Shri P.Rajeev raises Questions on UIDAI

Question asked by  MP Shri P. Rajeev

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 
MINISTRY OF   PLANNING 
RAJYA SABHA 
QUESTION NO  1788
ANSWERED  ON  25.11.2010
CLIENT ENROLLMENT SYSTEM OF AADHAAR . 
1788  SHRI P. RAJEEVE 

Will the Minister of PLANNING  be pleased to  state :-

(a) whether Government is aware of the adoption of  proprietary operating system owned by Microsoft alone for client  enrollment system of Aadhaar;

(b) whether Government would  intervene to ensure the use of vendor neutral systems and open  technological standards for client enrollment system of Aadhaar as the  proprietary formats and standards will end up in vendor dependency, 
increased coast and finally preventing the mass of the people from using  the facilities due to prohibitive cost; and

(c) whether  Government would consider adopting cheaper technology and network architecture alternatives of distributed data bases and citizen  identification methodology based on Local Self Government Institution data  centres and data for Aadhaar?   

ANSWER:    
 
MINISTER OF STATE FOR PLANNING, PARLIAMENTARY AFFAIRS,  PERSONNEL PUBLIC
GRIEVANCES & PENSION
(SHRI V.  NARAYANASAMY)

(a): Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI)  has not adopted a ‘Microsoft only’ client enrollment system. UIDAI is  developing a multi platform client enrollment system that will work on  Linux, Microsoft and Mac.

(b): UIDAI has, through standards,  encouraged several device manufacturers to integrate to the client  enrollment platform.

(c): The mandate of UIDAI is to issue unique  identification numbers to all the residents in the country. The UID number  is not a proof of citizenship. UIDAI enrolment database is centralized for  de-duplication and ensuring uniqueness
across the country. UIDAI programme  architecture, however, allows use of distributed databases for  authentication at different locations.