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

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

8923 - Expert Take: The internet is coming, finally Economic Times

12 Oct, 2015, 11.08AM IST

By Dhirendra Kumar

Even as digital revolution is transforming every kind of commerce, investing in mutual funds seems firmly stuck in the early years of internet-enablement. Think of a youthful new investor, used to downloading an app or opening a website and getting everything done within minutes. Such an investor would be surprised to discover that face-to-face, physical verification and even paper forms are still the modus operandi for investing in mutual funds.

No mutual fund will let you invest without such a process, even if you have an Aadhaar number and a net banking-enabled bank account linked to Aadhaar. The surprising thing is that if you have these two, then you can start a new National Pension System (NPS) account and begin investing in it through an entirely online process. But in mutual funds, no such thing can be done. Recently , in an interview with Value Research's Mutual Fund Insight, I asked Sebi Chief UK Sinha why this was the case. His answer was a surprising one. He said that such a thing was possible and had been so for a year.However, MFs choose not do so. 

This seems to be the case because under the Prevention of Money Laundering Scheme, the onus of positively identifying its own customers lies with each business independently . They take the view that it doesn't matter if someone has been biometrically identified by Aadhar, and has had an in-person verification for a bank account linked to that Aadhaar! My mind goes back to 1992, when the IPO of Master Gain, a closedend fund from the then Unit Trust of India unexpectedly got 65 lakh applications. These were paper forms which people queued up to first buy and then deposit. Most banking, cheque clearing, record keeping statements, unit transfers etc were all obviously paperbased and manual. A significant chunk of investors had long-run ning issues because of faulty records, signature mismatches and other problems. I know because I was one of them. Even at the time, it was obvious that complete computerisation and networking was the only way forward. And yet, if you had told me back in the day that fully networked and computerised access to autorickshaws would arrive before it would for mutual funds, it wouldn't even have sounded like a good joke.However, I'm sure that these days will soon pass. The kind of push that is now coming from customers as well as regulators for end-toend digital flow for investing mean that it won't be long before change arrives. Sebi has set up a committee under Nandan Nilekani to lay out a roadmap on the issue, and RBI is apparently on board for bank KYCs being valid.Sinha believes that we are heading for a quantum leap in the way people get digital access to fund in vesting. 

What is needed is a unified way for investors to start and access fund through a single interface for all funds. Of course, like all such changes, this will be disruptive for many who are part of the process now. There will no doubt be disintermediation, and there will be a levelling of the playing field between big players and small. No doubt, the big players will not like it and will resist it in some way . That's where both customer pressure and regulatory push will play a role. The potential of the pie becoming larger should surely be the bigger attraction than fighting over slices of a smaller pie. 

The point about digital transactions is not that they should be not just possible but overwhelmingly more convenient and substantially cheaper. If that is true then usage will explode. The benefits that will come through are enormous.It should be easy and quick to learn about MF investing, choose an investment and then transact with minimal friction. The democratisation of investing that can come through such access can have a transformative effect on the whole activity of investing. 

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