AADHAAR RELATED ARTICLES: 1648 - UIDAI caught in a power wrangle

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

Saturday, October 1, 2011

1648 - UIDAI caught in a power wrangle - Domain.b

29 September 2011

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) may have to extend its deadline for issuing biometric identification numbers for all residents in the country further with the finance ministry denying required funds for the UID-Aadhar project that is already running behind schedule

The finance ministry is reported to have declined a hike in the outlay for UIDAI to Rs18,000 crore, from the current Rs3,023 crore, in the wake of a tussle between the authority and the Planning Commission.

UIDAI, led by Nandan Nilekani, former CEO of IT major Infosys, is reported to have demanded an increase in Plan outlay for the `Aadhar' project to Rs18,000 crore, in order to cover the entire population of the country, against the previously-set target of 200 million people.

The current Plan outlay for the `Aadhar' project is about Rs3,023 crore It seems the Plan panel now wants to get back control of oversight over UIDAI, which it had surrendered in November 2009 when it delegated financial powers to the UIDAI.

The Planning Commission is reported to have sought the appointment of independent financial advisors to monitor finances of UIDAI and has suggested an administrative structure that has inbuilt powers to control expenditure.

"The UIDAI's present system represents a major departure from government procedures and removes all inbuilt checks and balances. We need a relook at the UIDAI's administrative structure," the commission wrote in a letter to the finance ministry.

While the plan panel is questioning the independence of the Nandan Nilekani-led UIDAI, the latter says its powers were derived from the government and orders issued by the Planning Commission itself. Obviously, the plan panel, which is used to bureaucratic ways of functioning, cannot stand an innovative and independent functioning of the UIDAI.

UIDAI director-general R S Sharma, meanwhile, said the authority is dealing directly with the finance secretary owing to a notification issued by the Planning Commission itself. "If it wishes to undo its own notifications or orders, it is free to do so," he added.

Nadan Nilekani, who took over the reins of UIDAI in 2009, enjoys the powers of a secretary in any of the ministries and is entitled to take decisions independently For the Panning Commission, however, the problem is finding money to finance a project whose cost goes on escalating without the project itself moving apace.

Nilekani, however, claims that more than a million people will enroll for unique Aadhaar identity number each day by October, against the 37 million people across the country covered so far.

"The goal is to give 1.2 billion people unique number and that is well on its way. We have already given unique numbers to 37 million people, another 50 million people enrolled and are waiting to get numbers," Nilekani said at a function in New Delhi today.

The UID project has already missed the 30 September deadline for issuing unique identification numbers to all the people in the national capital. So far, only 4.55 million (or 27 per cent) of the capital's population has been enrolled and only 9.5 lakh UID-Aadhaar numbers have been generated. The Delhi government has now set a 2 January 2012 deadline for covering the population of an estimated 16.7 million in the National Capital Region.

The problem is that unlike other state agencies, UIDAI-Aadhaar is dependent solely on private agencies to finish its work. Unless the private agencies engaged for the purpose speed up the process, UIDAI will have to go on extending deadlines.

On top of it, the finance ministry has now extended the terms of reference of the authority to recommend a unified architecture for direct transfer of subsidies to beneficiaries using Aadhaar.

"It has been decided to extend the terms of reference to include an Aadhaar-enabled unified payment infrastructure," the ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.

Aadhaar, the most ambitious project of the UPA government, is expected to bring in cashless, all-electronic transactions, using micro-ATMs with a fingerprint reader.

The Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) at Powai is expected to test the first of the Aadhaar authentication systems with Unique IDs at the end of the current year.