AADHAAR RELATED ARTICLES: 2755 - PAN, AADHAAR, NPR govt looks at grand alliance

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

Friday, January 25, 2013

2755 - PAN, AADHAAR, NPR govt looks at grand alliance

PAN, AADHAAR, NPR govt looks at grand alliance

Idea of making PAN the national identification number has lost its fizz, but the government is now taking steps to link it to AADHAAR, NPR

Santosh Tiwari / New Delhi Oct 09, 2012, 18:00 IST

Almost about a decade back, Income Tax Department initiated a drive to spread the reach of Permanent Account Number (PAN) through an idea which many in the system believed could lead to disaster.

Ignoring the skeptics, the I-T department outsourced the enrollment of people for PAN cards throughout the country. The grand plan associated with the whole exercise, was to turn PAN into a national identification number by introducing biometric features.

In due course, however, it was realized that PAN had its own limitations as people looked at it as some kind of tax trap. The number of PAN card holders and income tax returns filed at present, tell the story. Income tax returns filed in the country is around 35 million only while the total number of PAN card holders is about 120 million.

The thought of making PAN the national identification number has lost its fizz but the government is now taking steps to link it to AADHAAR and NPR (National Population Register).

A provision has already been made to provide AADHAAR number allotted by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to the Indian citizens in PAN application Form 49A on voluntary basis.

The existing PAN holders can also add information of their AADHAAR number to the I-T department while applying for a new PAN card or making some changes or correction in their existing PAN details.

Discussions are also going on with the PAN service providers and UIDAI to start the procedure of online authentication of AADHAAR on the basis of demographic and biometric attributes of the PAN applicants.

This would mean that after online authentication of AADHAAR, the assessee information can be enabled in PAN database immediately.

The Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India also proposed to the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) recently to link PAN with NPR. Under the proposal, Ministry of Home Affairs will store PAN information along with the NPR data on the smart card to be issued as Resident Identity Cards.

The consent regarding storing PAN information along with NPR data with certain observations has been sent by the CBDT to the home ministry.

All the NPR cards will also have AADHAAR numbers, and thus PAN, NPR and AADHAAR would be linked with each-other in the ultimate run.

The whole system will be critical for the government for identification, authentication and also investigation purposes.

The UIDAI will soon start providing the electronic authentication platform based on AADHAAR information to the banks for opening of accounts and other service providers including telecom companies for giving connections.

This facility would allow banks and other service providers check the details of a person applying for their services online from the AADHAAR database.

The whole PAN-AADHAAR-NPR system, which appears scattered at present, is expected to take concrete shape, once the coverage of AADHAAR number grows substantially in the coming months.

The government had earlier this year devised an integrated approach to end the conflict between UIDAI and NPR.

It cleared a scheme under which UIDAI has been allowed to enroll additional 400 million people in 16 states over its initial mandate of enrolling 200 million people. In other states, NPR will do the job of collecting biometric data. Both will give AADHAAR numbers to the people they will register.

The scheme will ensure that the whole of country gets AADHAAR number by 2014.

In case of discrepancies between UIDAI data and NPR data, NPR will prevail.

The chip-based Multipurpose National Identity Card issued by the NPR will capture 15 details of every individual.

So, the stage is set for a co-ordinated functioning of the three critical individual identification modes – PAN, NPR and AADHAAR.

While primary use of PAN is for the tax purposes, AADHAAR will help in identifying right people for disbursement of cash subsidy and entitlements to the beneficiaries and NPR will facilitate identification for the purposes pertaining to law enforcement.

All the three together will be a potent tool for any government agency to do profiling of any individual or a group of people quickly and effectively and this will not only help in revenue but also in public administration.