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

Thursday, June 21, 2012

2618 - Modi scuttles PC’s smart card project

Modi scuttles PC’s smart card project

New Delhi, June 12, 2012, DHNS:

Gujarat govt believes methodology for vetting citizens’ status fraught with danger

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi doesn’t pull his punches when it comes to confronting the UPA government. In his latest show of aggression, Modi has nixed Union Home Minister P Chidambaram’s ambitious pet project of launching Resident Identity Cards (RICs) in the coastal areas of the state.

Modi argued that the methodology adopted for vetting citizens’ status was fraught with danger. The Home Ministry’s plan of handing over the second batch of RICs to adults of the age of 18 years and above in more than 650 villages of the coastal belt of Gujarat has come to a halt.

In January, Chidambaram had handed over the identity cards in Andaman & Nicobar Islands, where the issue of profiling did not crop up.

The country’ coastal belt spread over nine states and four Union territories were marked first for providing identity cards owing to security concerns raised after the 9/11 terror attacks in Mumbai.

The approved cost of the scheme is Rs 216.31 crore. The state’s general administration department wrote to Directorate of Census Operations in Gandhinagar last month, saying that the distribution of RICs must be put on hold till Chief Minister Modi gets a response on the issues raised regarding giving citizen cards, Registrar General of India (RGI) sources said.

Social vetting

For verifying the antecedents of villagers, the RGI, which reports to Home Ministry, has opted for ‘social vetting’ done by ‘gramsabhas’. State government officials were designated for collecting the data on residents which were socially vetted before using them to make individual cards. However, the Gujarat government is of the view that the process of social vetting is not a foolproof way of profiling citizenship status of individuals.

The Modi government believes that the Centre cannot ignore the state for organizing a function to handover the cards.The spat between the Home Ministry and BJP state government has been happening for the last two years and letters have been exchanged between Chidambaram and Modi articulating their views on strengthening the verification process of identifying individuals. It is learnt that as early as March 2010, Modi in a written communiqué to Chidamabram, had questioned the method used for the verification of citizenship status carried out for the National Population Register (NPR).The chief minister had suggested that state should be involved to cement this process crucial to establishing effective delivery systems for executing policies as well.

Political issue

RGI sources said that the minister had replied to the chief minister, explaining that his views were taken on board while seeking broader consultations with other states for tying up the lose ends of the authentication process. Sources said Modi appears to be making a political issue out of this.

The National Population Register aims at compiling a comprehensive database of residents in the country with their unique identification numbers which would be provided by another body Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).

The RIC is a smart card carrying 64 KB micro processor chip. It incorporates several physical security features like Guilloché patterns, hot stamped hologram and micro text etc.The demographic data collection of 1.2 crore persons and the biometrics of 75 lakh persons in the 3331 coastal villages under the coastal NPR project have been completed, the Home Ministry had earlier stated.