*Parliamentary Committee Rejects UID Project & Biometric based NPR*
*Vindicates Citizens Demand for reviewing UID and NPR *
New Delhi/ 22/12/2011: The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance considering the National Identification Authority of India (NIDAI) Bill, 2010 presented its report to the Parliament on December 13, 2011. The report rejects biometric data based identification of Indians. The report is a severe indictment of the hasty and `directionless' project which has been "conceptualised with no clarity of purpose". Even the functional basis of the Unique Identification Authority of India UIDAI is unclear and yet the project has been rolled out.
The Standing Committee found the biometric technology `uncertain' and 'untested'. As early as December 2009, the Biometric Data Committee had found that the error rate using fingerprints was inordinately high. In a recent interview to the press, the Director General and Mission Director of the UIDAI had admitted that fingerprints are likely not to work for authentication. The error rate could end up excluding up to 15% of the population. Yet, the UIDAI has gone on with the exercise.
There is no data protection law in place. Even though the government had recognised the need for a law to deal with security and confidentiality of information, imposition of obligation of disclosure of information in certain cases, impersonation at the time of enrolment, investigation of acts that constitute offences and unauthorised disclosure of information, the Unique Identification (UID) project was allowed to march on without any such protection being put in place. This disdain for the law has been characterised by the Standing Committee as `unethical and violative of Parliament's prerogatives'.
Mr Nandan Manohar Nilekani, as a member or chairperson of multiple committees of several ministries, has been trying to push for the adoption of the UID, and for the re-engineering of current systems to fit the requirements of the UID. There have been attempts to withdraw services such as LPG if a person has not enrolled for a UID. The creeping of voluntariness into compulsion through threat of discontinuance of services has been roundly castigated by the Standing Committee.
On September 28, 2010, a statement of concern issued by 17 eminent citizens had asked for the project to be put on hold till a feasibility study was done, a cost: benefit analysis undertaken, a law of privacy put in place and the various concerns of surveillance, tracking, profiling, tagging and convergence of data be addressed. None of this has happened till today. The Standing Committee has endorsed these concerns and recognised that the project cannot carry on till this is set right.
There has been an extraordinary amount of duplication of work. The NPR is doing the same exercise, except that the Ministry of Home Affairs has found that the excessive outsourcing and the methods used by the UIDAI for enrolment make the data inaccurate and insecure. The multiplicity of Registrars with whom the UIDAI has entered into MoUs produces their own problems of duplication. The Standing Committee is categorical that the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) constituted for the purpose of collating the two schemes namely, the UID and National Population Register (NPR), has failed.
The project has been replete with unanswered questions. The 17 eminent citizens, as also other civil society activists and academics, had asked that the project authorities acknowledge that many countries had abandoned identity schemes such as had happened in the UK, China, USA, Australia and the Philippines. The Standing Committee has taken on board studies done in the UK on the identity scheme that was begun and later withdrawn in May 2010, where the problems were identified to include "
(a) huge cost involved and possible cost overruns; (b) too complex;
(c) untested, unreliable and unsafe technology; (d) possibility of risk to the safety and security of citizens; and
(e) requirement of high standard security measures, which would result in escalating the estimated operational costs."
Corroborating citizens’ concerns, the Standing Committee has noted that the government has “admitted that
(a) no committee has been constituted to study the financial implications of the UID scheme; and
(b) comparative costs of the aadhaar number and various existing ID documents are also not available.”
It discloses that while the UIDAI was constituted on January 28, 2009 without parliamentary approval, and UID numbers were begun to be rolled out in September 2010, the Detailed Project Report of the UID Scheme was done much later in April, 2011. The Standing Committee expressed its anxiety that, the way the project had been run, “the scheme may end up being dependent on private agencies, despite contractual agreement made by the UIDAI with several private vendors.”
The report records the views of Dr Usha Ramanathan, a noted jurist saying, “It is a plain misconception to think that the executive can do what it pleases, including in relation to infringing constitutional rights and protections for the reason that Parliament and legislatures have the power to make law on the subject.” In view of the above, the Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) signed by UIDAI with the partners including all the States and Union Territories, 25 financial institutions (including LIC) to act as Registrars for implementing the UID scheme has become of doubtful legality.
“I would have liked to make an additional point about the perspective Adhaar reflects vis-a-vis governance of our country and the conduct of our society. The only inference one can reasonably draw is that the votaries of this idea expect the Indian state to perpetually or for a long time remain in the *mai-baap *role, personally taking care of each of its needychildren. Why else would we want to spend so much money on a device only meant to enable the *mai-baap* to correctly identify its children?” said Deep Joshi, member, National Advisory Council in a statement sent to Gopal Krishna of Citizens Forum for Civil Liberties (CFCL).
Prof. (Dr) Mohan Rao, Centre for Social Medicine & Community Health, Jawaharlal Nehru University said, UID is dangerous for public health. It should be rejected unequivocally because it violates confidentiality and privacy which is considred sacred in medical practice and is sought to be used for accuracy in clinical trials".
At the Press Conference, Gopal Krishna said, "Both the UID and NPR project has been about technology that is flawed, with risks to national and individual security, ill conceived in its aims and uses, and has attempted to occupy a place where it can be above the law." He revealed that journalists have been compeleld to accept biometric identification in the offices where they work. They have been made to accept it as a fait accompli. As a consequence they have not reported about violation of privacy rights due to biometric identification of citizens and residents of India under UID and NPR.
In relation to biometrics, the NPR too is guilty of going beyond the mandate give to it by law.
Neither the Citizenship Act 1955 nor the Citizenship Rules of 2003 permit the collection of biometrics.The Standing Committee, recognising this, has asked that the use of biometrics in the NPR be examined by Parliament. Till then, it can be safely assumed, the collection of biometrics must be suspended.
Raj Mathur, Free Software, OpenStandard and Privacy advocate said, there is a an open war declared on sensitive personal information. Once the database is ready it can be used to eliminate minority communities by some regime which finds them unsuitable for their for their political projects. The fact is a centralized electronic
database and privavcy both are conceptually contradictory.
Indu Prakash Singh, a senior official of Indo-Global Social Service Society (IGSSS) explained why IGSSS disassociated itself from UID Number project which was being undertaken under Mission Convergence in Delhi. Withdrawal of IGSSS that works in 21 states of the country across four core areas India: Sustainable Livelihood, Youth Development, Disaster Risk Reduction, and Urban Poverty merits the attention of all the states and civil society organisations especially those who are unwittingly involved in the UID Number enrollment process. In its withdrawal letter IGSSS said, “we will not be able to continue to do UID enrolment, as we discussed in the meeting of 10th May 2011.” It added, it is taking step because `it’s hosted under the rubric of UNDP’s “Innovation Support for Social Protection:
Institutionalizing Conditional Cash Transfers“
[Award ID: 00049804, Project: 00061073; Confer: Output 1, Target 1.2 (a) & Output 3 (a), (b)]. In fact we had no clue of this until recently when we searched the web and got this information.’
It is clear that both Mission Convergence and UIDAI have been hiding these crucial facts with ulterior motives. The letter reads, “IGSSS like many other leading civil society groups and individuals are opposed to conditional cash transfers and the UID will be used to dictate it.”
The name of IGSSS is mentioned on the UIDAI’s website at http://uidai.gov.in/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=146&Itemid=157#con
It is high time some Civil Society Organisations mentioned on UIDAI's website that considered UID useful reconsidered their views in view of the Standing Committee's report.
Indian Social Action Forum (INSAF), General Secretary, Chiitaranjan Singh underlined the people's protest against the UID and NPR PROJECT which has been going on since the outset across the country.
Bezwada Wilson, Convenor, Safai Karmachari Andolan (SKA) said that it is an unnecessary project which must be stopped. These investments need to be made in the sanitation sector which is far more pressing need then any manufactured identification need.
Kalyani Menon-Sen, Independent Researcher on Urban issues said, most manual workers of both organised and unorganised sector lose their finger prints.The project claimed to work for them but it is they who would get excluded. It is not a financial inclusion project, its an exclusion project.
Peace and Action Centre (PEACE), Director, Anil Chaudhury said that the project is a perenial bail out package for the IT industry. It is not the question of one time cost being incurred but also of the recurring cost of the UID and NPR project that reveals its character which does not have any constitutional or rational basis.
For Details: Ramesh Sharma, INSAF Phone: +91-11-2651781, Fax: +91-11-26517814, Gopal Krishna, CFCL, Mb: 9818089660,
E-mail: krishna1715@gmail.com
