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, April 14, 2017

11043 - Aadhaar: The Brainwave of Crony Capitalism? - The Citizen


Wednesday, April 12,2017

NEW DELHI: When asked about why India chose to go with the UID/Aadhaar model when several countries like France, Britain and Germany have disbanded such identification projects, Nandan Nilekani, a former official of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) replied in an interview to Business Line, “Their purpose was not development, inclusion, saving government money or curbing corruption. How can you compare Aadhaar with the smart card project in some other country? Even I would have disbanded those”.

His reply is a classic case of misrepresentation and sophistry. It represents a sample of all the replies UIDAI’s has provided to concerned Indians since its inception.

Take the case of Britain, mentioned by Nilekani, a 15-page Wipro document, titled 'Does India need a Unique Identity Number?’ cited the example of the United Kingdom's Identity Cards Act, 2006, on page no. 6 to advance the argument for a biometric UID/Aadhaar number in India. If it was not comparable as Nilekani will have us believe, why did Wipro cite Britain’s identification project to make a case for UID/Aadhaar for Indians.

Wipro’s document is significant because UIDAI and UID/Aadhaar is a product of a 14-page long document titled 'Strategic Vision: Unique Identification of Residents' prepared by Wipro Ltd. and submitted to the Planning Commission in July 2006. The vision statement reads: 'Creating a unique identification system of all residents in the country for efficient, transparent, reliable and effective delivery of various welfare and private services to the common person.' The cover page of the document mentions the National Institute for Smart Government (NISG), Department of Information Technology (now named MeitY-Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology), and Wipro Consulting. Admittedly, Wipro was the consultant for the design phase and programme management phase of the pilot UIDAI project.

The Hyderabad-based NISG is a not-for-profit company incorporated in 2002 by the Government of India and Nasscom. NISG aims to 'establish itself as an institution of excellence in e-governance and to leverage private sector resources through a public-private-partnership mode in establishing eIndia.'

But when the UK government stopped its biometric National Identity Cards Scheme neither Wipro nor its donors and promoters in the government examined as to why the UK did so and why this decision too is relevant to India. The decision was announced in the British Parliament, the same legislature which passed the India Independence Act, 1947.

It must be recalled that under Nilekani’s tenure UIDAI extended “undue favour” to Wipro Ltd. As a consequence UIDAI incurred an avoidable expenditure of Rs.4.92 crore on an annual maintenance contract, according to the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India presented to the Parliament. UIDAI also incurred a loss of Rs.1.41 crore by not routing advertisements through the Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity. Unmindful of manifest conflict of interest UIDAI had entered into a contract with Wipro in May 2011 for supply, installation and commissioning of servers, storage systems, security systems and accessories with incidental services in the data centres of the authority in Bengaluru and Delhi/NCR at a cost of Rs.134.28 crore.
This is not the only case of irregularity and corruption by UIDAI. It awarded projects to several companies without issuing tenders. In a RTI reply UIDAI itself disclosed that total project contracts worth Rs.13,663.22 crore were awarded without any tenders of which an amount of Rs.6,563 crore has been already spent on issuing 90.3 crore Aadhar cards till May 2015.

It also informed that a total 25 companies were awarded different responsibilities for the massive project and their empanelment was done under the process guidelines of Request For Empanelment dated May 19, 2014. Notably, companies like Accenture (USA), L1 (France) and Ernst & Young has been given access to sensitive data of present and future Indians.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance its Sixty-Ninth Report on the ‘Demands for Grants (2013-14)’ observed, “A provision of Rs. 2,620 crore has been allocated in Budget Estimate (2013-14) for Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and a major part of the budget provision for Rs. 1,040 crore is earmarked for ‘Enrolment Authentication and Updation’, out of which an amount of Rs. 1,000 crore has been earmarked under the head ‘other charges’.”

The total budgetary allocation made for UIDAI since its inception upto 31 March 2014 was Rs 5440.30 crores. For the year 2009-10, it was Rs 120 crores. For 2010-11, it was Rs 1,900 crores. For 2011-12, it was Rs 1,470 crores 1,200. For 2012-13, it was 1,758 crores and for 2013-14, it was Rs 2,620.00 crores. For the year 2014-15, the budget estimate was Rs 2,039.

The budget estimate of expenditure on the project being implemented by UIDAI was Rs 2,000 crore in 20015-16. For the year 2016-17, the budget estimate was Rs 990 crores (that included 190 crore first supplementary).

As of February 2017, UIDAI has incurred a total cumulative expenditure of Rs 8,536.83 crores. This includes undefined “other charges” pointed out by the Parliamentary Committee. Shouldn’t UIDAI provide the details of the expenses incurred under “other charges”? Take the case of the year 2009-10 when the budget estimate was Rs 120 crores. The final expenditure was Rs 26.21 crores. In the year 2015-16 the budget estimate was Rs 2,000 crores but the final expenditure was Rs 1679 crores. In 2016-17, when budget estimate (BE) was Rs 990 crores, the final expenditure is Rs 877.16 crore upto February 2017.

The Parliamentary Committee on Finance has wondered in its report as to why inflated targets were consistently being given. It observed, “the total budgetary allocations made for UIDAI since its inception upto BE 2013-14 is Rs 5440.30 crore, out of which Rs. 2820.30 crore has been utilized upto 31.03.2013 and the remaining amount of Rs. 2620 has been allocated in BE 2013-14. The Ministry has informed that the average cost per card is estimated to range from Rs 100 to Rs 157. Taking the average cost per card to be Rs. 130, the total expenditure for issue of 60 crore cards is estimated to about Rs 7800 crore. Thus, the expected requirement of funds during 2013-14 is Rs. 4979.70 crores, whereas only Rs. 2620 crores have been kept for BE 2013-14, which is thus grossly inadequate.” It is apparent that there is more to it than meets the eye.

When Nilekani was asked about “concerns that the Aadhaar could be used in surveys such as the Socio-economic Caste Census (SECC) for racial profiling, or be linked to EVMs to determine voting patterns”his replay was evasive. He said, “The SECC or EVM machines have nothing to do with Aadhaar.”

Notably Aadhaar is the brand name of Unique Identification (UID) Number. The UID project was renamed the Aadhaar project after the UIDAI avowedly had a nationwide competition to find a logo and a brand name. Curiously, Aadhaar name echoes the name of Bangalore based Adhar Trust that Nilekani and Rohini Nilekani set up to fund their initiatives into a government function.

(Part 2: Here)

(Dr Gopal Krishna, Member, Citizens Forum for Civil Liberties (CFCL), who has been working on the subject of Big Data and biometric-digital surveillance technologies. He had appeared before the Parliamentary Standing on Finance that examined the Aadhaar Bill, 2010. He is editor of www.toxicswatch.org. )