Aadhaar for Dummies

A few days ago, Youtube channel The Liberated Indian took to the streets asking people what they know and think about the UPA government's flagship United Identification Number (UID) program, also known as Aadhaar. The results were comical. So I decided to put together a little column explaining the same. Read on.

Aadhaar - what is that, like, a mortgage?

The flash banner on the website of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UDAI) introduces  Aadhaar as “a 12-digit unique identity for every Indian individual, including children and infants”. It goes on to declare that the Aadhaar serves as proof of identity and address anywhere in India. What’s more, it’s a random number generated devoid of any classification based on caste, creed, religion and geography. Sounds pretty impressive, right?

Except, well, what the hell is the Unique Identification Authority of India?

The UDAI is an attached body of the Planning Commission of India, that was set up in February, 2009 to -you guessed it- issue Unique Identification Number (UDI) or Aadhaar to residents of India.

So it’s not for “every Indian individual”, then, as the UIDAI website puts it?

No. The Aadhaar can be issued to just about anybody residing in India, whether it be NRIs visiting relatives back home to attend a wedding or Israeli backpackers who’ve decided to prolong their  vacation and chill a little longer or even illegal refugees.

Well, if the government has a record of the address of every individual in the country, that’s good, right?      

Assuming you’re not one for Orwelian nightmares, the Aadhaar would still not a dependable database of residential addresses, simply because the Aadhaar is neither a legal requirement nor does it have any legal or statutory authority at the moment.   

Oh. Well if it’s voluntary, and has no legal authority, then it must be a low-budget pilot scheme for some distant greater good?

The jury is still out on this one, but if the UIDAI has some cohesive long-term strategy for the Aadhaar to become the norm, it’s still not very clear. What is clear however is that the Aadhaar is no low-budget pre-cursor to anything: to date, the UIDAI has spent more than Rs. 3500 crores on the Aadhaar, for a return of around 50 crore individual enrollments. In the words of Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar, the taxpayers’ remittances have been spent like “baap ka paisa” on this flagship program that appears to have no discernible end game.

But what about all that “technological innovation” spiel?

Sure, if you consider data collection to be a technological innovation. Leaving aside the fact that the Aadhaar infrastructure is built on foreign technology, the Aadhaar is about as technologically superior as any large scale data collection exercise like the Census or that flashy marketing agency disguised as a “consultant” that told us so many people watched the second last over of the semi-final of the cricket world cup without blinking an eyelid or flexing their right arm or scratching their stomach. That, plus it creates a biometric database.

A biometric what? That sounds very “national security”.  

Au contraire. The biometric database makes no difference to national security or to the reduction or monitoring of crime- as in the case of a DNA database for example- because the Aadhaar itself is a voluntary exercise and I can’t imagine many Veerappan-types lining up to sign up, can you? More importantly, it poses some serious security risks to the individuals who do sign up for the Aadhaar card because (1) the agencies that collect this information appear to have been appointed almost at random with no satisfactory background checks or qualifications, and (2) have you seriously never heard the phrase “Big Brother is watching you”? Go figure it out for yourself.   

Well at least the poor people will get their benefits without difficulty.

Err, the “poor people” will get their benefits and subsidies with as little- or much- difficulty as before they came into ownership of the Aadhaar. The Aadhaar makes no difference to the allocation and distribution of benefits because the Aadhaar itself is issued based on existing ineffective forms of data such as BPL cards and other traditional ID. As a matter of fact, the cost of some services like ATM banking will increase if banks are to upgrade to biometric ATMs. In any case, the idea of a centralized system to monitor benefits is just silly because ideally, as India develops, there should be greater financial devolution of the states to let them form their own benefit schemes.

Still, it’s all pretty harmless, right?

It hasn’t killed anybody, no. But considering the difference Rs. 3,500 crore could have made to a lot of people’s lives, I’d say it’s been a big waste of public resources and a serious misallocation of funds. Also, google “Aadhaar scandal”.

Last Indian Summer's Music Recco: Propaganda - Dead Prez (Let's Get Free, 2000)