Aadhaar: time to disown the idea

R Ramakumar should enhance his credibility by proposing an alternate system ( even if it has loopholes).As a citizen of this country I am happy that Aadhar will give me many facilities including an identity that I can use across the country.No more harassment.If Ramakumar has an alternative system he should propose it and get it passed. I will accept that. Till then I think that this demagogue (as he appears repeatedly in the Hindu), clever with words , should not attack this project. Every system in the world will have problems. Our Constitution is the most flawed system in the country on many counts. It is under this Constitution that basic rights of millions of oppressed are trampled upon with impunity.Compared to this monumental blunder the Aadhar Card offers millions an opportunity to live a decent life. Can this assistant professor offer them a better alternative? If not,give me Aadhar.

Bad, Bad, Bad reporting by this news paper. Standing comittee was supposed to submit its report in three months. But they wasted one year, at the end what came out of the comittee is worth nothing. The comittee did not even try to do objective analysis of the scheme. The whole report is politically bisased, and I condemn this new paper to publish the bad report with an ugly analsys. The expenditure numbers are wrong. UIDAI has mentioned that, cost of each number is about Rs 100 and if that is extrapolated for 120 crore people, the expense is 1200 crores is the base cost. For poor people, Rs 50 was reimbursed in Phase 1 and 2. if that is done for 60 crore people, that cost is Rs 3000 crore. Rs 72,000 crore is wild imagination. It only helps to spread false information.

A Scheduled Bank's Passbook is more than sufficient to prove an individual's idenyiyy.

Why is India worried about biometrics when the whole world finds it good.Do we still want people of neigbouring states to pur in and take our resources? and they stay without any identity and all political parties will make efforts to issue them identity before elections. The rest is politics of ego..and people just fall into trap ...There should be something unique that identifies as an INDIAN .Don't depend on the so called many cards that can easily made in a DTP centre.we want UID anyway.

Aadhar has been an amibitious project and it's unfortunate that the concerns raised by SCoF are not thought out beforehand. May be the result of not taking all stake holders into confidence before making important decisions. Classic project mgmt mistake. Rather than wasting more resources on this impractical initiative, emphasis should now be on the lessons learned and try to reuse some of the data collected. For future, a framework to collect data from various other government sources should be established. Passport,Payroll,Tax,Electricity data may be a some sources of truth. A foolproof framework to enforce birth/death registration also should be devised. Instead of a perfect solution, framework should be designed in such a way to be be self-corrective over a period of time. User database built over a period of time may be more practical rather than everything once. I truly wish that valuable lesssons will be learnt from this experience for a better and sustainable solution in future.

Even though while launching the UIDAI scheme, the UPA Government had termed it the key to the growth engine and symbol of the new and modern India” and key to “bridging the two Indias”, where you “take some” from the “India of opportunity” and “put them” into the “India without opportunity, in effect it is a Biggest Business Opportunity since Liberalization and opportunity to prosper in this digital world through taxpayers hard-earned money. As uncertainty is looming at large on the faith of UIDAI due to the imminent standoff between UPA-II combine and the principal opposition party in the parliament and outside on this issue what will happen to the six crore Aadhaar numbers have been issued even before Parliament has taken up the matter for legislative discussion and the substantial amount from the taxpayers money that has already been spent on UIDAI. While the Government can very well reject the report of the Standing Committee and go ahead with the UIDAI project, in case if the Government decides to conveniently scrap the project for its Political survival as in the case of retreat noticed in FDI in retail sector and other issues, who will take the responsibility for the taxpayers money spent on this score?

Adhar project was started with much fanfare by PM himself and touted as most important. As of now it has collected data and it cost the public, as per news reports, more then Rs.500 crores. If it is discarded now it will be a huge waste of public money which could have been used otherwise. I am surprised to see the home ministry raising objection at this late stage and certain committee has not approved. That means, no proper study has been done and not all departments gave their views and the scheme was started without proper study. The waste of public money should not be condoned and those responsible should be punished. I feel a proper enquiry is ordered to find out the real cause of this calosal loss, instead of waiting to become a big scandal. It shows there is no coordination within the government where huge amount of public money is spent.

The idea behind the scheme is to root out corruption on government schemes. Ironically, I had to bribe to get the form and after giving the data, I have yet to get my Aadhar card though it is nearly five months since I applied.My problem is as to whom should I bribe to get the card?

The aadhar is a good move by the goverment but one with many holes in it. There has been objection from various quarters. With the kind of terror incidences and illegal migrants it is necessary to have such a project. There should be a data protection law to enable protection and remedy in case of data being accessed. The staggering cost also makes us rethink about the whole project.

Well, if you think this was the only way the UPA was Siphoning of money, then you should look at the other shell Corporations which they have made - NSDC, which on the face of it suggests that they wish to develop skills by distributing money (from Govt. provided corpus of 500 Cr. + 500 Cr.) to Pvt players without having any accountability. And similar is the case of NPCI. So the next time you hear a corporation whose name begins with N - National, think twice on what it actually does and whose purpose it fulfils.

Mr Ramakumar's article is a walk down a predictably short sighted path - instead of understanding the large scale benefits that identification can provide, in terms of targeted subsidies and other services and the savings that entails, he has chosen to portray the entire exercise as something which is a futile exercise and not something that is inherently a positive initiative which can be tinkered around with and made better. What I find particularly laughable is the respect that he clearly has for this committee whose primary objections seem to be procedural!

Any reasonable person would have expected far better from Mr Nilekani. Faced with problems of systemic data lacunae across various government-sponsored schemes over the years, the most critical task was to ensure a fool-proof data collection system. Instead, UIDAI adopted, perhaps deliberately, and perhaps driven by the kind of short-term target achievement focus that has become a hallmark of corporate business methods nowadays, a numbers approach (100mn, 200mn, 600 mn, 1.2 bn...) that has fallen disastrously short on quality. And for what? To adopt a centralised database system whose viability in India is no better than it could be anywhere in the world. The Wikileaks world, where people choose to compromise the most secure databases in the world. This is reality, technological reality. Mr Nilekani is selling a pie in the sky, and the author is right to point out the true cost, including, as SCoF has highlighted, the social cost of violation of prIvacy.

Nice and simple article.Hats off standing committee.Bye Bye Aadhar.

Good. The Aadhar project has too many loop holes and hence not fit to be considered as 'the single identity' for an Indian Citizen. Lets not waste money and resources on adding one more to a long list of identification documents already available.

This is a travesty of an analysis. The author has not invested any intellectual capital in producing this piece. SCoF needs to provide a legal justification with constitutional backing for why the UIDAI cannot exist as an executive body. This it has failed to do. Just stating that the jutification “does not satisfy the Committee” does not cut it. The only valid point that the SCoF has raised is the reliance on an introduction without verified address of residence. This must surely be addressed. I don't how the SCoF can claim that biometrics is not a trusted technology. A cursory reading of the subject proves otherwise. It is a shame when a legislative committee makes a statement without offering proof. The SCoF is too sloppy a piece of work to deserve any credit. It belongs in the dustbin.

Very Nice article,Thanks to the writer for letting us know the loops holes in AADHAAR project.My appreciations for standing committee who are doing a very good job irrespective of parties in building the nation in right direction be it AADHAAR project ,2g scam probe,CVC's appointment.It is one of the ambitious project of the UPA-2 and goverment should consider all the views before pushing the project forward any more as it is linked with a huge amount of people's money instead of pushing it back door.

Incredible! What a timely article! I thank The Hindu for sourcing such an important piece. As a citizen of India one would enjoy all the rights enshrined in the constituion. Right to privacy falls well under the ambit of fundamental rights. There were lot of rumours about the Aadhar project regarding its efficacy, safety and purpose. But the SCoF has now let the cat out of the bag, the common people should be sensitised of this for the government though elected by them does not possess the right to subdue their right to privacy. I have read a lot of negative stuff about Aadhar lately, but this hits the nail on the coffin, coming from the parliamentary body itself. UPA better take notice.

What about the thousands of crores already spent? No one is giving a clear reason why biometrics will fail. When you do iris scan, 10 fingers and facial recognition there is a very high probability of successful identification. There are definitely issues with this project but that is true of any large project. The standing committee should try for means to resolve these issues, not bring down the project for petty political gains and waste more of taxpayers money.

If the views of general public who showed eagerness to enroll themselves for Aaadhaar is heard, we can hear a chorus of anger, disappointment and frustration.There are no simple and fool proof background infrastructure in place. Many senior citizens will tell how they have ben made to run from pillar to post even to get the enrolment form. To say to all of them that they can get it downloaded from the computers will be ridiculous. So much for the preliminaries.There are enough indications that despite the hype and fanfare, the projectv is a non starter and if the project is to be adamantly pursued, it will lead us to another chaotic situation.With the issuance of voters id card, there is afairly well established data base. Efforts should be made to weed out bogus cards and the additional inputs to make them unique can be a better option and less taxing to the public and will reduce wasteful expenditure.It will be in national interest to shelve the project to nip another scam in the bud.

oh really it is a baseless project and it was only for UPA-II popularty and for making all foreigners indian citizen for their vote bank . who gave right to waste public money for such base less project and without the constitution permission. It is also a part of scam.

Mr.Ramkumar's 'opinion' seems predetermined and exploiting the standing committee findings. His voice is like the mob frenzy who rant 'hang' 'burn'. I find it insensitive to educated minds who can decide for themselves. Before publishing an extreme view point, the paper should verify twice and even then hesitate to print strong views loaded with bias.

Kudos to the Representatives of SCoF for raising the Aadhaar Issue on time. The small office certified for issuing Aadhaar nearby our residence finds it diffuclt to handle the crowd waiting from early morning hours to get the application by noon. Appointments are given only after a few days for the collection of biometrics. An office goer is penalised of two days of his CL just to have have his identity registered. Calculate for the billions of office goers,the waste of his/her productive time. It is a national waste on productivity. To add, peoples apathy on Aadhaar is worsened by the frequent failures of the electronic gadgets in the issuing office, semi skilled or ignorant operators, high MTBF, poor service rates, absence of standby or replacement electronic gadgets and so on. It is less likely that Aadhaar can be successful in mighty populated countries like India where quality of technology management and service ae still under debate.

Whether it is issue of voters identity card or collection of census data the approach of govt is always casual.There is no credibility in the data and every effort is made to make that system failure.The same thing is being done with adhar scheme also.Instead of suggesting improvement to the system instead of pointing to only lacunae is a typical Indian way of looking at the problem.to say it in tamil "potham pothuvile ethayavadhu sollittu poidaradhu" without thinking about the consequences.It will really be sad if and when adhar scheme is scrapped.

There should be a pause to look at the major objections to this project and the worthlessness of the objections. 1)Lack of authority - if there is a violation of the law , let a FIR or PIL be filed. 2)Huge amounts of money being wasted - Rs 170,000 crores of annual subsidy is being spent by the government with leakages over 50 percent.This is a one time investment of 20,000cr that can bring leakages to under 2 percent. 3)Cost benefit analysis - the cost benefit analysis of having an Indian government funded by tax payers money is about 15 percent according to Rajeev Gandhi. Let us get rid of this government. 4)The article has merely reported what someone else has said. There is no independent analysis of the observations of the Parliamentary Committee nor is there critical analysis on the Committee's observations. 5)Biometrics - Nobody has proved that fingerprints and iris scans taken together are a failure. If failure rate is 1%,so? 5)The NPR can be scrapped.Why Aadhar?

There was a report that Aadhaar is making a backdoor entry. It is sheer folly on the part of the oil marketing companies to start insisting on Aadhaar Card, when Parliament is yet to approve the scheme and foolproof method has not been made for the issue of the cards. More centres to be opened in every locality and the cards should be issued without any hassle. Now one has to run from pillar to post to locate a centre and if one reaches the Centre he is told to come some other day to collect the token for visiting for fingerprinting etc. The oil marketing companies will do well to wait and not jump the gun when Government and the UIDAI are still dithering. In the context of ScoF’s report, it is better the Aadhaar Project is shelved.

No doubt "AADHAR"is a great initiative by the govt. Rather than castigating the project,the report of the SCoF must be taken in constructive manner and steps should be taken to ensure that all the points raised by SCoF committee are well studied and taken care of.

Aadhar number is akin to the SSN number in the US. Most legal residents can register to get SSN number. However, illegal immigrants or those who donot qualify for getting social security can get an alternative ITIN number.These numbers provide a digital identity to residents and make it very easy to track-predominantly the financial transactions of a resident. I strongly feel that Indian citizens should have a 'digital identity' of their own. As our economy gallops,we need better ways to track, file and compile data about 1.2 billion people in this country. However, AADHAR should be designed in such a way that citizens, legal residents and illegal immigrants or those with questionable status in India get different patterns of this number.

This excellent article brings to light yet another bungling of the UPA 2 government that is in utter disarray. The points raised by SCoF have been flouted by the government in an attitude of 'who are to question?'. It is hard to believe, that the government was not aware of the futility of such a project or the procedural lapses it has committed. The argument that executive could function with out legislation is frivolous, particularly related to a project that costs a whooping Rs.72000 crores and also poses potential threat to National security. The entire government is directionless and appears senile and insensitive to rationale. ‘Vinasa Kale Vibhareetha Buddhi' the Sanskrit adage is the most appropriate description of the attitude of the current UPA2 government.

SCoF has done justice to Indians. Aadhar instead of strengthening security compromises not only security but also privacy. India must learn lessons from other countries's mistakes instead of committing the same mistakes.

I put myself in the position of a member of the corrupt politician-bureaucrat-businessman nexus and started thinking. It will be too bad if every one gets an identity. How can I take/give bribes if all transactions happen electronically? How can I divert funds meant for the poor? How can I stash money in foreign banks. How can I make money for my 5th generation? It will be too bad if the poor do not remain poor. The best way to get peace is to form a committee. Give it about 10 years to give a report. Take another 10 to deliberate on it and then shelve it. By then my grandson will be ready to play the same game all over again.

Aadhar is faulty. passport could be faked. ration card can be got by bribing. bank pass book can be got with the connivance of bank authorities. so status quo? All these are the defects in the system. You plug these loop-holes. in our country, most of the people are genuine Indians. Some of them are intruders. why don't you segregate the doubtful and issue Aadhar to the rest and settle the doubtful cases after proper scrutiny. even in the case of the intruders, they have intruded because they found our country better than the place from where they came. The govt. cannot effectively seal its borders. why blame the intruder. they may be given a temporary residency cards.or deport them. for those who are talking about privacy - man is a social animal. if he steps out of his house, then others should know who he is. then only others' safety is ensured. because of the absence of identity, criminals escape.how many have jumped bails? disappeared? So aadhar is a must to get rid of our ills.

I really wonder whether people that jump at making nasty comments even bother reading the argument. Mr. Saurabh Sharma should make attempts at countering the argument at an intellectual level rather than succumbing to bitter rambling.
1)Check the backlog of the judicial system and make judgments on the efficacy of taking that route. 2)What are these "wasted" subsidies? Elaborate a bit further please. Secondly, the claim that it will bring the leakages down to 2% is just that, a trumped up number without any logical reasoning - demagogic, if you will. 3)Poor source, poorer comment. 4)The writer has written prolifically in both the Hindu and Frontline magazine with independent analysis of it. 5)Read R.Ramakumar's argument again. 6)See no. 5.As for Mr. Sekhar, only if inter/extrapolating worked, everyone in India would be earning 50K a month.

This is regrettably, a very parochial opinion. I understand the right to bring forth reservations about certain issues of what could potentially be a landmark project in India. Why is it suggested that it is impossible to look for avenues to address the concerns put forth by the Parliamentary Committee? The writer seems to have shown a lot of exuberance in calling for the scheme to be revoked outright, which is inexplicable. It is said that the Aadhar numbers could fall into the wrong hands to fake identities. Though it is a palpable issue, it is not going to set any new precedent. Aren't passports, driving licenses & PAN cards faked and don't they continue to get faked? The writer mentions in the last paragraph that alternative and cheaper measures should be initiated to provide people with valid identity cards. I think we already have them. The Aadhar numbers would be a valid addition.

Its difficult to find out whether its a critical analysis or a charter of agreement. Ramakumar has just reiterated what SCoF has mentioned. His own views comprise just that last one paragraph. Don't know Ramakumar's credentials and this short-sited, lop-sided piece of writing doesn't help. After reading Nilekani's book on India and his work with infosys, giving respect to this article is difficult (specially when it has no detailed analysis, no concrete examples and no convincing proofs). Expect much better from The hindu !!

Sir, UPA is facing opposition for yet another good & useful project aimed at the poor & vulnerable. I think the main drawback of the whole project is the amount spent on taking iris scan & finger prints. I think the cost could be brought down drastically by embedded technology where a chip would be inserted in every one. The technology for this futuristic technology already exists. This technology is the future as this has been predicted even in the bible. 'It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name.' (Revelation 13:16,17).

We Indians have the great ration card. Why then Aadhar digital? We Indians have swanky ration shops and efficient PDS. Why FDI in retail? Let's not accept anything creative but disown all ideas. Ramkumar seems to be in this mood and copies the report in toto. Any solutions to improve the scene is missing. ScoF report also unilateral. Plain Aadhar scoffing piece, this!

After investing so much money, time and effort ,scrapping the UID project is suicidal. The SCoF should have enunciated what was good and acceptable in the aadhaar scheme. If multiple agencies are pulling their weight in different directions the loser is the country .Scrapping an existing scheme and taking off on a new set up is very easy.If a built in mechanism for incremental corrections doesn't exist we will always be at the starting post. UID card is not critical for those with PAN cards and bank accounts but for those without an address temporary or permanent.If Mr.Nilekeni found the queries of SCoF to be an eye opener, it could mean he did not have many questioners in his team .Decentralised data collection via registrars is a good idea.But too many data fields are relevant only for a miniscule minority ,those who are bothered about data privacy. Can we do away with them ? Much should have been done before grounding the scheme.It is not too late if egos are set aside.

This UID project is the worst thing for Indians in general. This is the first and gigantic step is losing privacy and once you get in, there is no way of getting out. Going by the track record of Indian government for the past 60 years, UID is as good as posting your private details in internet and depending on your luck that no one else will abuse that details.We are going down the path the US is, giving away personal freedom for (imaginary) security.

I think fight against UID is more important than fighting corruption, people should first understand the consequence of losing your privacy. Once you lost it you can never, NEVER get it back. Fight against corruption can wait.

In our haste, we should not forget the fact that Aadhaar is a voluntary enrollment system. If a citizen feels the system is not secure enough to guarantee privacy they have a choice not to enroll. Most IT projects do have cost overruns but that does not mean they should not be attempted in the first place. One example of wasted subsidies is LPG connections. LPG cylinders obtained with bogus names are sold to restaurants and other businesses. Similar loopholes are exploited in tax evasion, ration cards and many more. If we have to do a true cost benefit analysis Aadhaar will win hands down, SCoF or otherwise.

It is observations given by the ScoF. Please allow UIDAI to justify. Do not pass comments casually to a GAME changing project which will bring in LOT of accountability to the NEEDY people.

Nice Article. I mean the english used. Why are we making such a hue & cry on Aadhaar? Do you really know how much is spent on NPR (the one by Home Minister Chidambaram's ministry)? The answer is no. Everyone is saying that we accept something which is discussed only in Parliament and never comes out to the open. Why sideline aadhaar. Why dont' we have some patience instead. The country spends crores of money on Politicians security. We never cry? Why is that. We spent 20 Crores till date on the fugitive Kasab. If every fugitive is kept behind bars and we spend such money. That's not public waste. We don't cry. But when 75,000 crores is spent on every indian resident, we are crying. Why can't we leave this habit of accusing and accept something like Aadhaar. The main problem with Aadhaar is that it can be used against a politician anywhere within India. His accounts can be checked since Aadhaar number would get linked to his account. Let's say OK to Aadhaar...........

Mr Azad, pl google total subsidies given by the Indian government as also read on this topic. This figure has its origins in this. As for the two percent figure it is based on the experience of computerizing manual systems. I have personally worked over the last three decades on this. Look at the corruption weeded out in the railway passenger system, the airline booking system and in private companies. Yes, I am becoming aware that Ramakumar is a favourite in the Hindu group - I do not think he has competence to write on this topic. Neither does he have personal experience in computerization of large scale systems nor is he an expert on biometrics. An associate professorship in TISS is a licence to teach at TISS and perhaps expertise on his subject viz social sciences but computerization?Biometrics?Pioneering systems implementation? If you see his article carefully he merely quoted everyone and has nothing of his own to say here. Can he propose a system for discussion?

UPA government run by Manmohan singh, Chidambaram,Sibal,Ahmed Patel doesn't have any respect for the Parlimentary process.Their hasty actions to bring legislations like Aadhar , FDI in retail, Splitting of Andhra etc or their inaction to bring effective lokpal bill for decades all prove this fact.They keep shouting at the roof top that Anna hazare and his team do not believe in parlimentary process, but on the ground it is these so called intellectual crap who don't give a damn to the parlimentary process.Any opposition to their thought process is termed as Pro-BJP and anti-secular.

The Parliament's Standing Committee may have some opinion but the corporate IT sector's lobbyists have a different opinion. India is to be made a developed country by eradicating the painful poverty conditions in which its majority of women, children and men live -- a fancy showoff project which has so many flaws does not help.

The article and the esteemed comments gave me an interesting reading. This indeed reflects the true Indian way of thinking on any matter. Any program must be well thought by professionals and Expert groups before it is taken for implementation and UIDAI(Aadhar)is no exception. In India, unfortunately, we have no unanimity on any matter and hardly respect anyone. Dr.Manmohan Singh is a good economist PM even though he is politically a failure. Nandan Nilekani is a highly successful enterprenuer.He is not there to amass some money to his company but to strengthen the national interest. India has so far achieved limited success in Agri. revolution, White revolution & low grade success in industrial revolution but good success in population revolution. But for our awakening & thumping success in software revolution,the nation would have been alongside Somalia & Ethiopia. Is our democracy functioning perfectly? Our endeavour must be make the 'Aadhar' exercise succeed & erase defects later.

Clearly this article raises serious concerns but what my conscience says there must be some positive aspects of this scheme which author has not cited,may be he can write down another article giving the nother side as well and elaborating all consequences which India is facing due to absence of any reliable,authentic and integrated data set of 1.2 billion people.One can say after reading this piece of article that Govt. has not followed the necessary course of law making process and concerns of various stakeholders were not taken into considerations while implementing a huge project.But instead of such a scathing attack on the overall UID scheme,the author could have suggested appropriate means by which we can reach to any integrated mechanism.We know there are multiple schemes going on to address the same problem of "Unique Identity".We don't want only the criticism but the ways how we can really move forward collectively by integrating the existing schemes in a cost effective way.

I find it interesting that Saurabhs, Sekhars and Sridhars etc are not happy with Ramakumar's article. It is not Rama Kumar's fault that the Standing Committee trashed Aadhaar. It is not the standing committees fault that the NIAI Bill was flawed and ill conceived. The Planning Ministry had no clear answers to questions Raised by the standing Committee. They had no answer for why a Feasibility study was not done and why a Cost benefit analysis was not furnished.
Ask yourself these questions: Had UIDAI been headed by say Ex Cabinet Minister Raja or by CWG Chief Suresh Kalmadi would you all criticise the Standing Committee and Rama Kumar ? Had NN remained CEO of Infosys and PM had given the Contract to Infosys, would you agree with the slipshod way NN has managed this Project ? The fault lies squarely with Nandan Nilekani for the way he mishandled the project from word Go. He refused to debate issues or answer questions raised and bulldozed his way. UID is so flawed it has to stop.

The author does not propose any viable alternatives. The argument that nothing should be done unless it is perfect is the reason the nation is held back. Plug the loopholes and move on. Ramkumar attacks Aadhar as being part of Neo Liberal agenda. In most places, it would be attacked as being part of a nationalistic agenda. Even if the wastage of subsidies is brought down by less than hoped for, wouldn't it still be better than now? Aadhar or any alternative unique number could be used to reduce corruption drastically. No cost is too high if this is achievable.

Biometrics as an id /auth factor is born from b grade movies. Biometrics, like any living system, suffers from all the normal processes of a living system. Consequently there is tremendous variability due to environment, health, age, profession etc, in ones biometrics. While there exists ample evidence of why biometrics cannot be used as a deduplicator, which the UIDAI convinently choose to ignore, it has been short shrifted by the UIDAI's own biometric's panel. The vetting of documents (demographic data) was discarded based on the presumption that biometrics is infallible. Having realised that even with it's horrendous margins of errors, de duplicating biometrics would take forever, the UIDAI trashed it's own assumptions and started issuing uins based on un vetted demographic data. The result 20 to 45% higher number of residents as per uins issued. A physical door to door survey (conducted by NPR) is unable to locate these extra persons. So much for Unique identity and all that jazz.

Its neck and neck till now. 16 for and 16 against.Mine is the final nail in the coffin. I am on the side of Vineet, Natarajan, Prof A Venki,Suresh Swaminathan, S Srinivas, Saurabh Sharma(2 times), Shekhar, Rajesh, Sridhar, Vijay, Mira Pawar, Santosh C, Lal, E Krishnadas, Siddharth...

Hope some of the comments (that are against this article) here will be published in the Letters to the Editor section of The Hindu. I for one, was almost completely gave up on UID after reading this article. Thanks for the comments posted against the article; let me wait and watch the fate of this project.

Our country will need technology to transform and it would require some visionary leaders and not doubting thomases. The role of legislators is critical and we need to pay heed to their questions and provide the necessary clarifications and also take safeguards as we proceed on a large transformational project as Aadhar. However I would request our learned legislators that they owe this project to the next generation of India and hence not call for scrapping it.

The aadhaar project may not be as of now fully foolproof. but certainly it would pave way for better and quicker distribution of government subsidy to the needy to whom it is meant for. Today the recurring leakage of huge subsidy amount through middlemen is much more than the cost estimate of the project. So we should not drop but keep the provision for step up improvement which can be upgraded over the period.

We need CBI investigation on how this fradulent project called Aadhar was started. Who are the biometric experts who rode rough shod over their own biometric committee's report ? Just because someone has had success in outsourcing businesss does not qualify him to speak on these deep technology issues. The result is there for all to see. It takes Rs. 30/- worth of material to fool UIDAI's biometric scanner. So much for unique identity. And we dont even know if de-duplication is working; we will never know because the technology is properietory to some foreign company and they call it open. Open my foot. You analyse Aadhar and you will see lies and half-lies all over the place. Indeed, the SCoF needs to be applauded for giving a unique kick on the backside to this project meant to skim off thousands of crores in the name of the poor. I would certainly like to see some heads roll for this big fraud.

we are really being harvested dumb. people themselves are ASKING to be barcoded.. i cant believe it. for the first time i feel satisfied at the working ethics of scof. but what scof did not mention is that the data gathered for adhar is outsourced to and handled by CIA backed companies in the US. thanks to the the few left real beaurocrats who revealed this info. Great Work TheHindu. you are the only true newspaper for us left uncorrupted. i wish u come up in electronic media against the toi.

UID is one of the best systems India ever build for personal identification so far, can these people justify the fake passposrt cases, fake ration cards, fake banking accounts, fake residance proofs.

It looks like most of the politicians want India to be used and misuse individuals identity as much posible

Even if some add population gets enrolled even than its fine to trace that person and his movements and trascation more accurately. as UID doesn't provide a free mony/food/resource to any one to loot.

but think over another two years from now this data becomes most important for the banks/ration card/Visa/intrusion/registration/police/crimal investigations/ elections/Indurance etc fools want to keep India in dark when whole world is enjoing the benfit of it.

Having a unique identity has many advantages.There may be loop holes in this AADHAR project.They should be discussed and solutions should be found out.I think this is the optimistic way rather than scrapping the project completely.

For any reason if the Aadhaar is stopped, the government should pay back
the cost incurred by people to en-roll in it. Myself along with family
members, spent a day to register us, if this is scrapped I would go to
court to seek compensation for time/expenditure.

I am a common man. I don't know the finer details of the benefits or disadvantages of this project. But i know how things work in india. No matter what ever fool proof system you have, if you have enough money, you can bend any system. Many of the commentors have written in favour of AAdhar and they have questioned the competency of this Author. But what is disappointing is they have not replied to the questions raised in this article. It doesn't matter whether the author analysed independently or he included the questions from SCoF, but they are valid questions which must be answered. Especially if the questions regarding the estimated costs of 72,000 crore and realisation of project objective due to uncertainity in biometric accuracy aren't answered, then this project must be scrapped. Again i came to know about the SCoF questions through this article, so it doesn't matter whether the author analysed independently or not. As a common man, i want responsible answers to these questions

The concept behind the Aadhaar project is the need of the hour. Because we are a vast country with millions of poor, illiterate people, our problems do get compounded. But in this article, the author should have tried to portray a more balanced view. Any project of this magnitude will raise concerns, but the solution is not to dump the project, but to try to address the genuine concerns.
It has been mentioned that there are alternatives, but are they perfect? We need to keep in kind, perfection is not ready made... we evolve and slowly but surely, we can fix all loopholes. Only, we need toapproach this with an open mind.

Hon. P M of India and planning commission of India are quite optimistic about all reforms whether it ia UIDAI or FDI but its our perspective to look at it.
Although AADHAR project didnot mention prior advantages on existing identity sysytem, it would have higher technological implications & lacuneas but only on such ground project could not be rejected. Although developed countries like U K had failed to implement wont assure it will fail definately in India.
Offcourse technology may rise cost of project but here it is exagerrated. Though it is not nationwide implementable for all reason purposed by Nilekani( NREGA worker enumeration, PDS leakage) but would have better utility for other reasons like health card etc.
audit & strong monitoring is essential to maintain finance & national data base.

In my layman perspective and understanding of the Aadhaar project,let me
put it in a simple way, I have more faith and trust in the vision,
abilities and goodwill of Nandan Nilekani for the well being of common
man than that of those out of touch and mostly corrupt MPs sitting in
our Parliament and its various Standing Committees.

The nation has been fooled into believing that Aadhaar is a magic bullet that will fix
leakages in PDS and NREGA and other GoI subsidies estimated as about Rs 300,000
Crores. When we say leakages in PDS we are talking about poor people double
dipping, rich people drawing rations and theft in the distribution system. By finger
printing poor people, we are treating every one who is poor as a criminal. When did
poverty become a Crime ? What if a poor woman cheats and buys double the quota
of 35 kilos of grains per month to feed starving children. Which is a bigger theft,
buying an extra 35 kilos at subsidised rates or UIDAI splurging thousands of crores
just to enrol the entire nation. Does this make sense ? Not to me. Every one forgets
that the nation was told that it would cost Rs 35 per person to enroll and we now
know that it costs Rs 400 or more per person for enrolment. How much is Rs 400 x
1.2 Billion ? Authentication has not even included here. This is the truth

So many here question why Rama Kumar does not offer solutions to the
problem.Why should he ? It is like asking Nato forces and rebels to teach Gadafis
troops how to fight better.. To the person who mentioned having read Imagining
India and believes NN is a visionary... Yes that was the aim to market the idea
through a book and then leverage the book to mesmerise the nation. Just like UID
there is nothing Unique about Imagining India. UID in fact is an Idea in Conflict. Here
is what NN wrote in his Book Imagining India on Page 50: “In Terms of
Implementing Policies that are good for you, whether you like it or not, autocratic
regimes are far better than democracies” (Page 50, Imagining India). We have seen
how autocratic he has been as UIDAI Chief. Had he been humble and paid attention
to his critics, he could have salvaged this project . Unfortunately ego came in the
way. It had to be his way or Highway....Many UIDAI experts have abandoned ship and
makes you wonder why ?

an excellently writen article. objectins by SCoF r vital & have far
reachng conseqnces. sily denials & 1/2hearted defnds dat appear in
comments suporting UID brngs forth lack of public awareness. Social
Security Number (SSN) of US is not at al an "Aadhaar like thing". SSN
does not store biometrics or any other sensitive details. it just
relates to name of a person.
cost of project by some estimates could b as high as 1,50,000 crores.
real cost could be even higher for as London School of Economics
report on UK ID showed cost of the project would escalate for sure.
No Other Alterntive argment canot b a justificatn 4 the wastage of
public money without 4prior launch study, cost-benefit analysis,
comparitive study & enabling law. evn a deatiled project report ws
prepared in april 2011 only (2 yrs aftr it took off) the SCoF has
pointd alternatves like isuing secure ration cards, say wit hologrm.
Biometrics is abandned by d US,UK,China n al devlopd democracies &
institutionsNIST, LSE,NPL

JT Desouza and Ramkumar, the author, should give us technical evidence of what is the failure rate of the biometrics and biometrics combination that the UIDAI is using. If it is ten percent of our population that has duplicates, then this project is worth reconsidering. Of course some may plump for even 1%. What is acceptable and non-acceptable? I would plump for less than one percent as being acceptable and I have an engineering background.Social scientists,your take?

One must remember that it is impossible for the fingerprint, the eyescan and the photo ALL to match in 2 persons. If indeed this can be made to match , the effort that is required would only be worthy of a criminal. ALL systems attract criminals and collusion. We cannot deny a system because criminals will succeed.

The NPR has not even started work Mr Desouza - it is in the fitness of things that the 1m/day Aadhar do its work ,that is half the work of NPR.If required NPR can tag these residents as citizens or not.

It is sad that people like Mr Ramkumar have taken a very corrosive and negative stand on aadhaar from day one. I have read his articles and find no mention of an alternate scheme (if not aadhaar).Please be aware that several western countries already have significant investment and running services based on Social Security Number (USA) and National Insurance Number (UK). So their need to invest in technologies like finger printing, IRIS recognition is not even needed. Many seem to miss this point and simply say that (it failed in West, so it will fail here) Well if so , why don't you answer this question: (Unrestrained Media, rule of law sustained in West, so why does it not sustain in India?). Every country has its own features and circumstances that may prevent some schemes. Really the way Aadhaar was organized and the number of organizations who were registered as Registrars and the whole process was near perfect in my opinion. Sad Mr Ramkumar does not realize it.

Simply put, Mr Nandan ex-CEO Infosys didn't follow project management concepts, tools, processes and methods in the Aadhar project and funny thing is Infy and all IT companies demand PMP certification from the employees, is it just for the sake of marketing? If not to apply proper processes and knowledge from project management. It is shocking to know his team didn't even get to proof of concept "the inability of Proof of Concept studies to promise low error rates when 1.2 billion persons are enrolled;" and went ahead with the project. Also any project involving software is full of uncertainty, just check on US government websites how many software projects have met the deadlines and worked within the project? Once a project containing the software starts, even the managers will not know when it is going to complete, they can just give estimation based on some assumption, there is no science involved in estimation as in construction or other businesses.

Peoples against UID project is one who is taking advantage of present system.If UID is fully implemented looting the poor peoples subsidy is impossible.And mainly ministers like PC can't win election through manipulation. Each and every individual counted through UID. Now one can easily make any number of identities and even get more than one passport.

The deceit inherent in the UID project seems to have been missed by the comments. The idea of a national ID originated in the aftermath of the Kargil war. A foolish opinion was propagated that national ID cards would help prevent cross-border terrorism and combat illegal immigration. It was not implemented. UPA revived it by imparting the spin of a pro-poor stance. It was opined, “The poor lack identity and are denied welfare services”. Unsubstantiated Claims were made of savings in PDS, NREGS etc. Studies show that the truth is different. A simple question exposes the deception of both UIDAI and Government. If UID was meant for the poor who lack identity, why does UIDAI ask those who want to register to provide documentary proof (there are 14 documents, ration cards, driving licenses, and so on), of both identity and address? There are many more serious aspects, which space does not permit me to expose. Those interested may follow the court case against UIDAI before a Bangalore court.

Scrapping the Aadhar scheme is no answer for this problem,instead its existing loopholes must be rectified. The introducer system can be replaced with other residence proof IDs in future enrollment.If we persisitently start questioning and moth-balling such innovative technical policies, we are bound to end in a state of policy paralysis.

Having a unique identity would be an excellent idea for security concerns and lots of other good reasons but the standing committee seems right in few points. Why the scheme was not brought under statutory authority. i appreciate govt effort (if there was not any coveted political move ) to at least think of an idea of having unique identities for everyone in india. now the thing is, this is not the end of the word . keeping committee's points in its mind all political parties should support Aadhar and at this point also the necessary changes can be designed. but dropping aadhar idea. A) would not be in India's interests B) Will just bring another defame (like reversal of FDI)to govt and country as well on world platform, C ) we will miss opportunity to have a scheme that has proven positive outcomes in developed countries. like LOKPAL, UIDAI CAN BE ANOTHER JEWEL FOR INDIA AND THE GOVT CAN TAKE CREDIT OF IMPLEMENTING BOTH IF KEEPS GUTS TO WORK HARDER ON THE ISSUES.

The write up analyses well the points. Aadhar project is a total waste. all that is required is to ensure that either the voters id which is a complete authority should be strengthened or the ration card system by public distribution system should be strengthened. In the form, part c elicits information about bank accounts and it is very objectionable to ask whether one wants to open an account with a particular bank or if he or she has account elsewhere and if so particulars with a declaration that there is no objection for anyone to use those personal information for any purpose whatsoever!

Interesting article.Apart from cost perspective, which is very huge. I had other thoughts, when I went to 'Aadhar' centre for getting enrolled. A. For each entry, it took about 15 to 20 minutes per person to get all details & biometric captured. If this is the case, imagine the amount of time it would take to get 120 crores of population. What would be the schedule time line for completion of our population? Many years?
B. If we are successfully able to complete this project, the data storage required would be voluminous - GBs (since images - biometrics) are to the stored. The maintenance of such system would require huge cost for servers, software update, patches etc. This may be multiple crores of Rs annually.
C. A common man already suppose to have enrolled for these identification namely, - Voter Id, PAN, Passport. Expect for Biometric this data should be present already, not sure why this data cannot be cleansed and used (if we do away with Biometric).

whatever the SCof says ,i think there should be proper discussion before finally suspending the AADHAR.

@ Mr. Saurabh Sharma: I am very well aware of the subsidies provided by the government, the question pertains more to those subsidies being "wasted". An empirical proof of that claim would be appreciated, from a strictly economic perspective. Without any offense, your experience in the field doesn't prove validity of anything. By virtue of any adopted method, one cannot discount one million variables that play out in determining the outcome. The railway reservation system, also pointed out by the bureaucratic head of the UIDAI in his rebuff to R.Ramakumar, is a poor parallel to draw with the UIDAI, in every respect. Everything doesn't have a simple technocratic answer, you see. Least of all with the severe limitations of the current approach. I refuse to indulge in menial arguments on the authors competence, it would be better, I reiterate, that you challenge him at the level of intellect, by means of a valid argument. As for his opinion, read the other pieces he has written.

Mr. Sharma instead of prattling on like a broken record why dont you do your home work. Google is your friend. You are an engineer? what a pity. The first thing an engineer does is search for measurable facts.
I have posted a second response too with my blog link, where there is much more detail than this 1000 char limit will permit. I hope it is not moderated out. Briefly, I had demoed and presented the details of why biometrics wont work at B'lore and specifically requested IAS officer Shri Vidyshankar to provide the same set of equipments as used by UIDAI for public audit + meeting with UIDAI tech team. More than a year later, all we hear are the same lies repeated ad-nauseum.
In a recent reply to an RTI, it was amply clear that the UIDAI specified margin of error was a disaster, and even worse, they have absolutely no way of actually measuring false accepts or false rejects. While we have made the effort to obtain info & verify facts, UIDAI supporters do no such thing. Only noise

The Professor must understand that this is not how the cost of any project is calculated. Initially, lot of infrastructure was to be put in place and now we just need the working capital. These are utmost basics of Finance. So, the total cost should be much less than 72,000 crore. Secondly, the feasibility issue. If something was not feasible in UK(despite it being technologically far superior than us), it does not mean that it cannot be done even in India.
Most important, this UID will help in building the links amongst every government deparment which will help common man get the services smoothly!

UIDAI has been in news for all the wrong reasons since its inception thanks to the clandestine gibberish work done by the concerned authorities.I was surprised but more or less frightened at the very thought that such an erroneous project was kick started without any valid study or legal backing to account for.This alone tells volumes of the way this country is governed.Why are we reluctant to learn from the international experience on the failings of the biometrics system? Then this is not about identifying the true beneficiaries but providing benefits to those whom the government identifies to be benefited-the ever powerful politician-corporate combo. The sad part is that in an erudite land like kerala ,the state government has already rolled out the scheme without giving much thought on its negatives.All said and done ,can i ask you something-WHY THIS KOLAVERI???

Instead of, or in addition to, spending so much on such projects, spend on educating people to become responsible to country, to society and to themselves. And you would not need to worry about the concerns that required implementation of such a project.

The ideas/arguments of the author show incoherent interpretation of the Aadhaar project from SCoF report. Only the financial feasibility part can be questioned or investigated as the data is available while all the other arguments are imaginary manifestations of the SCoF and the author.These arguments had been raised earlier especially about privacy and biometric but there is no evidence. Its like saying that Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs introduced in 1982) should not have been used in such a large country as they had never been tested before. There can 100s of arguments against EVMs but that has not stopped its implementation. Most people believe these machines are highly reliable. Compared to Aadhaar, misuse of EVMs can put our country in wrong hands. Dear Author, Please do a thorough research of (at least) Indian history before making such unintelligent arguments.

It is surprising how Indians in the charge of taking the country into the future have been dwelling in the dark ages. They had opposed computing in the Fifties but as the new millennium dawned, IT became the boon for the nation. The country has no clue who is a citizen and who is an illegal terrorist residing as one’s neighbor. They have no idea who is receiving welfare payments, ration cards, passports, and jobs. Nobody can tell if government welfare schemes have real people or ghost workers. Corrupt leaders have created thousands of benami owners of government donated land for their private gains. Previous Satyam computers was said to have been creative in showing real Indians as those who were being paid overseas while those people were not even employed by Satyam. Events have established beyond doubt the need for unique identification of Indian citizens.
It will be a lucrative business to own the machines that dole out these ID numbers and cards .

AADHAR was meant to finally credit the subsidies amount directly to the poor people's bank accounts by which the UPA could win elections in 2014.THE IDEA WAS TO GIVE WHITE MONEY TO POOR RATHER THAN BLACK MONEY!!that is why they were in a hurry to implement it without conducting proper studies.VOTE BANK POLITICS has gone to such an extent that the design of UPA govt to stay in power despite clear lack of governance is evident from its various actions recently.Appeasement of minorities at the time of elections,introducing FOOD SECURITIES Bill before UP elections are all clear indications of that.

For such a huge project, a pilot project whoudl have been donefor a particular state of town. That would have thrown up alot of issues which would have enabled the Aadhar scheme to make course corrections.A Project into the UNKNOWN REALM without knowing the consequences could prove disastrous."CORRECT AS YOU GO" after the project was implemented APPROACH would have been disastrous.I think the Govt relied too much on Nandan's words as he has been successful in Infosys and thought that he is the MIDAS of IT.Another aspect is that no SCBA (Social Cost Benefit Analysis) seems to have been made in this case as is the case with all MEGA projects of the Government.In fact approvals for major projects are given only after this appraisal is done and the results are POSITIVE.IT IS CLEAR THAT THE UPA 2 was in a hurry to find some way of DIRECTLY DISTRIBUTING MONEY to the people (BPL) to impress them, so that they can win UP elections and 2014 elections.HENCE THE EXECUTIVE DECISION IN HASTE!!

biometrics is a technology abandoned by the world. US, UK, Australia, Japan, philipines, holland & china avoided it. Top ten B schools in d world abandoned biometric ID project.national Institutes of Standards & technology and National Research Council of US, men frm National Physical Laboratary of UK, London School of Economics n London school of business say biometrics is iherently fallible, faulty n does not suit any government applications. National strategy for trusted IDs in cyber space does not mention biometrics at all. So is UKs digital identity assurance project. There are incidents of men imprisoned on the basis of biometric evidence (fingerprints) freed later. Finger prints can be faked under a $. iris scan was droped from UK ID project after they found it unreliable under varying lighting conditions. Even UIDAI is not usng facial recognition system for verification for its very faulty. If biometric numbering was a elixir, Pakistan wld hav been d best place in d world. it has a similar numbering project from 1960s.

Its a shame to see how readily the readers of this newspapers approve of an Orwellian system. Somebody mentioned about the idea's acceptance by the rest world. Well, clearly that person hasn't any idea about the problems of marginalisation and permanent erasure of identity that has been so rampantly practised by the State in those countries. In a society where pluralism is what has always been cherishes, an attempt such as this is corrupt in every sense of the term. Where half the rural population suffers from problems like cataract, and most manual labourers have hardly any finger prints to offer, its high time that those who support such initiatives know how most of the rural Indian population lives. Saurabh Sharma has asked if there is an alternative at all. The problem is that he feels the need of an alternative at all. Mr. Sharma, read Bush vs. Gore, and the story behined it, if you can.

What the starving under-nourished millions in India need is not an identity card. Their prime need is to have at least one square meal a day. For our political leaders poverty is just a four letter word. How many of them have risen from the poor strata of society or have made an attempt to know what poverty means? Marie Antoinette is perhaps their guide.

Standing committee have raised serious concerns about accountability of bio-metrics for the ID. But these are the systems we relay on today.. I mean even when u get a licence, gov. takes ur finger prints.If these systems are such fallible then we should not use them anywhere. This takes us to the next question: What we are gonna use for identity then? If not finger prints and iris scan?

The author has only reported what the Standing Committee conclusion. As regards this UID project, it is actually a waste of public money in its current form. Who requires the Aadhar card? The comments received from readers broadly concludes the need for Aadhar card for those sections of people who wants to be identified to new technologies and beyond that no gainsaying is found. Typically they inform that the leakages would be stopped pursuant to issuance of Aadhar Card are all far fetched, it does not take much time in duplicating these. The beneficiaries of the government schemes have already various cards bpl, etc., through which their needs are met. What is the great in duplicating these cards with fresh one. Further, the UID is capturing data of all residents in the country which may include illegal immigrants across the border giving rise to security concerns, it is high time the scheme is modified or scrapped in the light of the standing committee report.

Here is my comment on alternates, since this issue has come up a number of times in these comments. First of all, define the problem.Is the problem an identity? If so, study what are the issues with all the cards/ ids out there first. And see if they can be fixed. Dont think of a new one just like that. Is the new one any better? On what basis? Secondly what are the costs involved? Do a feasibility study, a cost benefit analysis before plunging into it and peddling it as the only solution. Do pilots that will cost much less, if at all these studies suggest that a new one is needed. Study pluses and minuses of biometrics. See how the negatives can be handled, if at all. All these are very essential issues. Take feedback from stakeholders, technologists. There is no dearth of them; dont pose as you are the only one who knows it all and the rest are dumb. The problem is that mistakes made cost huge, which is what has been shown in the UIDAI project.

It is really pity to note that nothing can be constructively implemented in this country ,the negative side of the democracy .Every new projects has got benefits and risks .but if the benefits are more in comparing with the risk .1% risk is magnified and 99%benefits are minimized .Every rose has got its own throne ,but see the beautiful side of it .

Already, we have 17 or 18 identities which the election commission of India recognizes one to cast his vote. While issuing Aadhaar card, the identities which are must for a citizen should be made to be produced for verification and they should be entered into data base for future verification. If Aadhaar is unsafe, how GOI permitted Indiapost to issue identification cards on payment of some fees? This must also be stopped forthwith. EB bill, house tax receipt etc can not be imaginary one. But, ration card can be bogus. Hence, GOI and states must identify first which can be bogus and these items should not be taken as basis.
Media reports said that Aadhaar cards issued was more than the census figures of population of some areas. How this could happen? Then Census department should also be roped in to issue Aadhaar. Further, Aadhaar card is very lengthy. It must be just like passport size. Aadhaar may be reexamined, but it must replace all 17/18 items by storing these in data base.

It is very sad that after getting ample proof of its fallibility people still opt to pursue and promote such a draconian step in the name of identifying true beneficiaries i.e the poor and the needy, who for sure will suffer along with their fellow country men.And going by some observations ,even if it has an error rate of 1 percent won't that be a huge number,1.2 crores to be exact. Then the huge amount involved-earlier i heard 50,000 cr to 1,50,000 cr.Anyway during these times of economic crunch ,what was the need to hasty implementation of such a project of himalayan proportion without legal backing,cost feasibility and technical study.Since it involves the security and privacy of the entire nation ,it must have sought Parliament's approval beforehand.The inability of UIDAI to address these concerns left more questions than answers.I do know that a credible sum of taxpayer's money is already washed away but it looks better to suspend the project at this juncture.

Singapore is an advanced IT using nation and unique numbers are issued without dependency on fancy biometrics. That is what is just needed, nothing more and nothign less. Nothing at all is to be gained by the extra complexity of biometrics. As regards India's corruption, the solution is not technology alone and Aadhar is not going to cut it, the solution requires checks and balances and exemplary disincentives against corrupt practices. The rate at which Aadhar is being pushed forward (example, in Kerala schools!) even before the Bill is passed gives rise to suspicions of an agenda. There is the feeling that 'daaal mein kuchch kaala hai'.

I wish Hindu could get us the actual facts about the project like cost, enrollments, organisation associated to use it, how far the card is mandatory, etc. Probably the details can provide the readers to understand the benefits of the project and on other side improvements can be suggested. If it was a more transparent project it would have been a great success.

Aadhar was an ambitious project that was very anxiously expected by indian's on this planet but turns out to be a disaster based on the report from SCOF. This report should have been the first thing the gov of india or the respective communities should have come out with. This shows the ways the things are being so lethargically handled especially with such critical projects which could change things drastaically. another goof up and its the tax money going to drains!!! No wonder the struggle from various communities on things like lokpal bill...which to date is suffering.

Why photo identity card scheme failed? Only because we have no real urge to complete any project.We Indians are unconcerned,indifferent to mundane life.Our highest aim is to libation from the bondage's of life and death.So we do all mundane work haphazardly,we don't devoted forcefully to complete the work.Same fate my be waiting to Aadhaar scheme.If we don't throw away the idea of MOKSHA from our psyche how can we became world power?

The readers should realize that need for biometrics in not an integral component of any UID system, but instead is a consequence of pervasive fraud and deception that is so well entrenched in Indian society. The only difference between Indian Aadhaar and American SSN is that the later does not require biometrics. Every individual in the US is required to get an SSN and is fundamental currency of transaction in private or state exchange.

I sat through the grind and got my Aadhar card. Though the process was little slow, was much faster than getting a passport.I think it is important to have bio-metric data and multiple identity cards in a large country like ours. This way, it helps in cross checking with the other existing cards like passport, pan card and thereby improve authenticity.

A really Eye opener.take for instance if china or any other country wants to know about the details of each soldier in Indian Army they can very well know without a data protection. Bangladeshis are having hamlets in eastcoast of India with their own sarpanch he can identify as many immigrants as Indians.If all deta are at one or multiple places chances of leakage is high as this would never be guarded like nuclear secrets.Businesses Foreign & Indian will try to hack into it to get immense opportunity from it.No one can then opt for a job in RAW or IB as others can know who are working there. really a lots of money cud hav been saved by tying it with sensus.Now at least protect the privacy & security of this country by destroying the data or keeping it very secure.Nilkeni is a businessman so he thinks like one"get to know as many customers as possible" just collect the loss of money from him why he jeopardised fundamental rights & national security without doing a proper study.

These days any issue becomes controversial.Who is responsible for such controversies.Is it MEDIA?They drag writers on both sides to high light the controversies..........only to their advantage. The project like AADHAR we must trust the honest man Mr.Murti whos has agreed to accept the job after lots of analysis and who has worked for day and night...only serve the national interest and not himself.

Please do not disown the idea of Aadhaar. There may be legal and administrative issues, in bringing out this National Identity Card. But this is a technology innovation, which will bring benefit to all. I am sure this National Identity Card will help in bringing out the benefits of the Government to all of us, with much ease in the near future. Moreover the Government of India, can formulaise many policies based on the National Identity card. In any project there bound to be security issues, but this can be taken care of as the technology is rolled out, in an phased manner. For example even during the introduction of Computers, there was a hue and cry against this machine. But now every one is getting benefited out of computerisation. I request the people who oppose this project to have a second thought.

Aadhaar wld perhaps b d 1st project of dis scale in d wrld, implementd without a feasibility study, cost benefit analysis, technical assessment, debate inside or outside d parliament or even an enablng law. Can u blieve, evn a detaild project report ws prepared only in april 2011 (2 yrs aftr d project took off). As SCoF rightly observd der was gratitous haste & evident lapses in procedures. D only plausible reason behind this must b d busines intrests involvd. If d govt hav a tint of respect for democratic values d project shld b scraped wit immediate effect & a comprehensive enquiry shld b ordered against those behind this colossal waste of public money. Aadhaar is nothng but a Scam in Making

We always hear the proponents asking for proof from the opponents. Guess waht. It's the UIDAI which is blowing up money and should have already had massive amounts of data to preclude the PSC very fundamnetal and basic questions. BTW these very same questions were posed to UIDAI in various public meets. Not only were the opponents not answered but quite rapidly, they were prevented from asking hard questions in other meets and such persons nt invited. One such case happened a few days ago, where The pompous Mr. NN could not provide any links to a shred of evidence against the POC. Now that the cat is out of the bag. How about all the regular faithfuls (like Mr. Sharma) who pop up from the wood work, mouthing the same rubbish, come up with hard evidence. Pointers to statistical data on biometrics, duplicate ids and proof that these systemic problems can be solved by centrailsed DBs. How entilements are refused due to lack of identity (LOL) rather than a set of feudal rules etc .

Learned Professor please provide us with a cheaper and more efficient system than Aadhar and we surely will abandon it. Till then we stick to this project. Flaws are an integral part of any system. There can never be a zero error system. The path ahead is to identify the loopholes and appoint experts and scientists to come up with a proper and thorough solution. Simply abandoning the project will do no good.

What about people who went through the whole drill and spent time ,
energy and money only to now find that the entire exercise was in
futility. Some have even got the Aadhar Card and now look stupid, having
boasted about their initiative and the result. All deserve compensation,
may be in the for of a Letter of Apology.May may not even care if any
Alternative Scheme of Things is instituted.

I had to move during my career from city to city and the amount of trouble I underwent to get an address proof God only knows. The post office has a scheme for verifying the address and give a card with address signature and photo. This is NOT acceptable to any institution , either for transfering gas connection , or for pass port or even for opening an account forget getting a ration card or driving licence. I recall our present Hon'ble priminister the economics doctor got elected to Rajya sabha , as a citizen of Guwahati!I wonder what address he gave while applying for being elected and I wonder what proof of address he gave !
As a responsible citizen I must have paid at least Rs 25 lacks during my career by way of income tax. I feel the Government should deem the tax paying citizen its cutomer and help him in all possible ways . I thought Adhar will give some identity for me at last. Now we are debating after reported spending of INR 500!
What an incompetence. !

d idea of aadhaar is not conceived 2 provide identity 2 d poor. Hw r they going 2 get identity if they need to provide othr ID cards 2 gt Aadhaar? Hw many gazetd oficers wl certify d millions of slum dwellers & rural poor? anti social elements wl get oportunity 2 get IDs whih wl turn detremental 2 national interests. real problms in our welfare schemes lies not wit IDs but wit administratv & structural inadequacies. Decentralised planing & social audits & betr management r d need of d hour

The whole idea of Aadhaar was to introduce a single ID card for Indians, which will be honoured all over India. Ration cards are written in local language and it is of no use. Moreover, ration card can be easily forged while PAN card does not have the holder's address. After spending so much money into the project, now scrapping the project will be a waste of money. The congress is developing cold feet because of the ensuing elections and it does not want to rub a particular minority community on the wrong side. The idea was to stop illegal migration from Bangladesh and Pakistan. But alas! The Aaadhar card itself says it is no proof of CITIZENSHIP. Another example of wasting public money in order to safeguard the vote bank.

Like the drowning man who will grab on to any sgred of a straw appearing before him, the poor Indian facing a bleak future pins all his hopes on Aadhar and is overjoyed at how easily he has been "alloted" his Aadhar number! Convincing a drowning man has never been a hard problem. Project costs will trickle in later and at that point of time the Aadhar enterprise will be "too big to let it fail" and too important. GoI will subsidise the private technology companies heavily, I predict. But I hope that time will prove me wrong !

The moderator of this article is so pathetic. Can't believe he/she felt
the need to to edit my earlier comment. The Hindu can't protect its reputation by editing comments that tend to expose the hypocrisy of the
author in question.

Our hopes of a well conceived system of issuing a single valid ID NO to be adopted by all service providers are being dashed, thanks to eggheads like Ramkumar.
Among the reasons for non acceptance, the most laughable is that it has no parliament sanction. I hope the standing committee realised that it is just not possible to run the parliament even for two days continuously nowadays. The second one was, illegals will get registered. If one wants to implement ID cards after all illegals are thrown out , then we can have this scheme only, as we say in tamil, when the waves come to a halt in the sea shore. Another anti AADHAR argument is the work is being duplicated. This is like the perennial question if egg should come first or the chicken, Any fool will understand that unless we have a Universal system in place legacy systems cannot go. I do not know on what basis the Committee doubts the percentage of false positives from biometrics and finger printing. Aren't there fakes now?

Why on earth parliament has allowed to gather so much personal data of individuals without
any safeguards. It is straight case of breech of individuals privacy. It is not acceptable at all.

How many IDs an individual need, PAN CARD, PASSPORT, VOTER CARD etc etc.. As it is
being issued to anyone who is residing in india hence it is just wastage of public money to
fund oblique objective of a corporate honcho.

People need identity. Identity is very powerful and its benefits are huge. Already huge sum of money has been spent on Aadhar and any further delays is going to cost the tax payers more. Any differences whether it be administrative or legal must be settled and project should go ahead with support from across everyone. No Politics. People trust Nandan Nilekani. They have great vision. God bless India.

Those who think the conclusion on biometrics technology by SCoF are
baseless, are the real idiots who do not understand anything about
technology, not even a simple act of googling for proper documents. The
UIDAI POC results and their analysis on the biometrics technology are
easily available on its own website and any sane person who knows little
bit of calculation will need 30 seconds to realize how futile the POC
results were for a country of the size of India.

I agree fully, with Mr.Ramkumar's views, though I had an AADHAR card, which I think less detailed than my VOTER ID card on which I have all my personal details, whre as on AADHAR my DOB is not mentioned ,even though I have provided all the data.I think Voter ID cards can be a Good enogh for AADHAR, in case of Minors may be AADHAAR ok, so that we can save a lot of money

For those who are asking Prof Ramkumar for viable alternatives, I have an analogy to consider.

Aadhar is like a billion rupee project to lay railway tracks leading all the way to the moon. We may have laid the tracks from Mumbai to Delhi and need more money to lay more tracks to reach the moon. And you are asking Prof Ramkumar to specify the alternate route, and demanding that he should provide the viable alternative or else just shut up.

I believe it is a fair analogy for you to consider. Thank you

Pressing on with the project in d absence of data protection laws & enabling legislation would expose the aadhaar-holders to danger of data misuse, data theft and permanent identity loss. data protection law is a prerequisite for effective grievance redress system. Own or Disown AADHAAR; there is no way to protect the data of the enrolled.

Jijeesh PB , Capturing signatures and fingerprints without safeguards has rendered our passport applications dangerous. Should we stop this ?

If UID Aadhaar is actually the magic wand to solve all the problems faced by Indians, why hasn't it been made mandatory? A major flaw is that it is issued to all residents of India, whether legal citizens or not. This makes a mockery of all the comments about Aadhaar contributing to national security and preventing draining of precious resources! Illegal immigrants, even terrorists, can use Aadhaar to obtain all the other documents and services like Voter ID cards, Ration cards, LPG connections, etc.
Mr. Nilekani should clarify if the data of the whole Indian population is being stored and collated here in India or elsewhere, perhaps in the US?Also, given the tendencies of the current Govt., will not Aadhaar be used to track and victimize people? The Govt. harps on Parliament being supreme, then why has the UID Aadhaar project been implemented WITHOUT parliament authorizing it?

It seems Aadhaar is optional, not mandatory. At the same time, it claims to streamline the Public distribution and other high sounding objectives. When all people are not under uid, how is it possible to streamline pds? it indirectly means uid is mandatory for the poor who use pds and not for others. This is the biggest flaw in its conception. In essense it tries to enumerate only simple and humble folks (for who knows what dubious purposes). If Aadhaar is not made mandatory to every resident/citizen (with or w/o biometrics), and this number is not recorded in every property registrations and other important transactions, Aadhaar is utter waste and a fraud on the country.

Aadhaar also claims to give country level identity. But, atleast 90% of the people don't need this country level id, as they hardly quit their states except for travels. As Aadhaar seems to give an id for the people migrating from state to state or having interests in multiple places, it may serve them.

It is to continue my previous comment,

Aadhaar wants to monitor half a billion small fishes. There are another half a billion fishes of various sizes and sharks and whales wreaking havoc and muddying the waters. Let Aadhaar include all the fishes small and big, i.e., ALL, in its enumeration and monitoring. Can it handle it? Does it have the guts and means? No? Then, hands off.

we should also think about the authenticity of these cards,which are being distributed to just fulfill the target of project.in the offices where these cards are being made the concern employees don't bother about the strong & genuine proof of identity of the applicant,they don't check whether the address proof & I.D proof given by u is genuine or fake.so, how we can hope that these cards holders will be genuine person.many incident i read in newspapers that the many criminals and immigrants got these uidai.recently Bhopal S.T.F caught few Naxalites & simi terrorists having these the card.so, the basic concern is that before launching such a large and important project these loopholes should be avoided because such loopholes leads to the failure of the whole projects.

This is to continue my previous comments.

The voluntary (not mandatory) Aadhaar can be simplified as the tool to authenticate migrant labourers only as non migrant rural people already have Ration cards. For this 'proof', they need to get finger-printed, iris-scanned, mug-shot! (in three angles?) if they desire to access pds and thereby participating in inclusive growth. What a honourable way to get inclusive growth. Can they come out of 'Aadhaar' when they decide to settle down in a place? or will they and their progenies ever be on 'Aadhaar'? Ramifications of selective Aadhaar is very very ugly. Only if it is for ALL and mandatory, it may be good. But then it is not so easy for us to implement it.

Giving an Aadhar number or and identity card to citizens is very much a real and feasible activity ;on a daily basis 1m Indians are receiving this number.

Where ,thus, is the analogy of a pathway to the moon ? Mr KR , kindly note that not only have we got a pathway to the moon, man has also landed on the moon.

Only visionaries share this dream ; mere mortals can only find faults , only to fall in line later. Thus, MR KR, both you and Ramakumar the author of this article should look at the moon with different eyes than those you have shown us so far.

Mr Desouza - You have not proved anything. I suggest that you duplicate yourself ( or say Nandan Nilekani)and present the duplicate i.e attempt an impersonation at a ration card office, at a railway ticket counter and at a bank. Chances are you will end up in jail. You can also challenge this false claim and public expenditure in a court of law through a PIL. Mr Acad - the total number of persons registered under the ration card scheme in TN were about 150% of the population. If you look you will find data on where subsidies are being siphoned off-eg. ask Aruna Roy who measured this for MGNREGA , the Rs 40,000 cr project. I will not waste time on Ramakumar or his clones here.

Well, the govt. shud hav considered SCOF's report b4 goin 4 such a project. When such a big investment is to b done, hw can u b careless? Y not learn from countries like china who had 2 shelve the biometrics clause? Why can't voter id b used in places where v wish to implement UID. India has many priorities, putting them in sequence will help or it will lead to debacle.With the growing Fiscal deficit, inflation digit reaching 9 and lack of infra for grain storage, shud v not focus in dat direction? 1st create facilities n den provide means to distribute them. Dont put the horse before the cart! Time hasn't gone. Scrap it!

SCoF and and other body of Parliamentarians will always object to projects like Aadhaar since it will plug the rampant corruption in the government. Do most people commenting against Aadhar know that in each Municipality and Government payrolls there are thousands of benami employees who are being paid monthly since there is now way to check. Biometrics is the most scientic and safe was to identify a person which is not easy to cheat which is why biometrics is extensively used in all security companies and secret projects for identification. Aadhar is one of the key stepping stone in moving towards India Against corruption and should be funded for accelerated implementation.

Well to start with, Please scrap this thing called UID or AAdhar. Mr
Rajesh Let me as you something? you just spoke about benami and
payroll etc and by biometrics you are going to solve all this issue.
Do you know what is India's Poverty rate and what is the money spent
on this project. Ok lets forget that, people like you wont mind if
some one is hungry but would be proud if that person gets a UID and he
can cook it 3 times a day and eat. If really feel bad when an India
citizen like you wants your hard earned money to be spend on something
like this which questions your privacy. I first freedom of a Citizen
is to keep his privacy and you want to loose your money and privacy
and lots of anger to the Jobless High profile official creatures who
started this ( got better words but cant use here).Thanks

Lot of people have commented about data secrecy and intrusion into
privacy. Is Aadhar the only one intruding into our privacy? How about
Bank accounts, PAN Card, Passport, Voters ID, Ration Card, Driving
license etc. Other than a passport how many of this documents have a
proper verification process to ascertain the authenticity of the
document. Even for Passports lot of fake documents are submitted and
only a few get caught. So why this big hue and cry for only Aadhar?
Most of the countries has multiple Identity proof requirements.
Instead of debating why Aadhar we should debate on how can we improve
the quality of data being collected and effectively over a period of
time can we reduce the No.of ID cards to just 3. Passport, Driving
license and Aadhar.