AADHAAR RELATED ARTICLES: 7596 - Kiwis need to stop thinking small, says Indian tycoon

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, March 27, 2015

7596 - Kiwis need to stop thinking small, says Indian tycoon - N Z Herald

Kiwis need to stop thinking small, says Indian tycoon

5:00 AM Tuesday Mar 17, 2015

Nandan Nilekani, chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UID), speaks during an interview in his office in New Delhi, India. Photo / Getty Images

Indian billionaire Nandan Nilekani says scale is a problem New Zealand companies need to overcome to crack the growing Indian market.

Nilekani has been twice named by Time magazine as one of the world's 100 most influential people and is the former chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), which is providing all 1.2 billion Indian residents with a unique identification number.

He is also co-founder of Infosys Technologies, which has 100,000 employees.

Nilekani understands scale, even in his philanthropic efforts. After losing a bid to get into politics last year, he's poured US$10 million ($13.56 million) into a not-for-profit initiative, ekStep, which is developing a platform based on gamification to change the way primary school education is taught in India.

The first iteration of the platform will be released next month and Nilekani said while it was aimed at resolving India's literacy and numeracy problems, it could easily be rolled out in other developing countries.

In his first visit to New Zealand, Nilekani said what had struck him about the Kiwi companies he'd talked to was they weren't used to dealing with scale because of the country's small population.

"Scale is not something you do after you have built your solutions.

"If you're going to have an impact in India, you have to have scale, and solutions need to be made differently so they're highly automated, low-cost, and developed so they can be used anytime, anywhere," he said.

New Zealand companies tended to be low volume and high cost and it needed to be the other way around to do business in India, a "price-sensitive" market, he said.

Developing scale was a mindset, said Reuben Abraham, chief executive of Indian think tank the IDFC Institute who, with Nilekani, was in Auckland for the India New Zealand Business Council summit.

"If you think small, you will remain small. You have to think big to have a shot," he said.

New Zealand companies should also look to do business at state rather than country level, Abraham said.

"India is not a single market activity and if you try to do that, you'll be in trouble. Governance at city level is broken, so you're stuck with states."

Companies should do their homework on which Indian states would suit best because there were significant differences between the progress and wealth achieved in some over others, he said.

- BusinessDesk