Mufti Islah
Srinagar: In Jammu and Kashmir the process of issuing Unique Identification cards to its citizens has fallen prey to red tapism. Months after Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was scanned for the Unique Identification Number or 'Aadhar' or UID, he is still to receive his card after the UID project was scrapped midway.
In a place marred by militancy, the UID drive would have helped the security situation a great deal, but strangely Jammu and Kashmir is the only state in the country where not a single enrollment has taken place in the last several months.
People are demanding that the Omar government explain why the exercise has been taken off yet.
Wipro Technolgies, Gurgaon and Srinagar's Comtech Technology won the bid to carry out the enrollment of 27 lakh and 45 lakh people respectively. The J&K Bank was appointed as the registrar, while the state IT department oversaw the process. However, midway, the government scrapped the contract, inviting fresh bids and criticism over its action.
Even as the J&K Bank and the IT officials pass the buck, sources say that both the companies were shown the door apparently to please a senior cabinet minister whose son has shown an interest in the project. The IT ministry, however, has its own reasons.
IT minister Aga Ruhulla said, "Procedures under which the bid was awarded didn't fulfill prescribed norms and after a re-evaluation, we decided to cancel it."
While UID enrollment gathers pace in other states, in Jammu and Kashmir it has become a casualty to bureaucratic red tapism and despite the Chief Minister and the Governor endorsing, it pretty much remains a no-show.