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

Thursday, November 9, 2017

12350 - 1,216.8 crore authentications: Govt swamps SC with UID data - TNN


Dhananjay Mahapatra| TNN | Nov 4, 2017, 02:13 IST

HIGHLIGHTS
  • The Centre said over 12.64 crore bank accounts were opened using Aadhaar-based e-KYC.
  • The country’s biggest employment mechanism for daily wagers under MGNREGA too saw a surge in use of Aadhaar.
  • The government added that linking of Aadhaar with PAN had helped in ensuring “one PAN to one person”.
Representative image
NEW DELHI: Bombarding the Supreme Court with statistics to convince it about ease of doing day-to-day activities with Aadhaar, the Centre said 118.64 crore Indians, which is 88% of the population, had obtained Aadhaar and they used it 1,216.8 crore times for authentication purposes.

"As of today, the total number of Aadhaar-based authentication is 12,168,022,172. Therefore, the Indian population has used Aadhaar-based authentication over 1,216 crore times to authenticate their identities and avail benefits and services under the Aadhaar Act and/or other laws," the Centre said in its affidavit filed through advocate Zoheb Hossain.

Challenging the petitioners' constant complaint that linking of biometrics collected through Aadhaar to banking and other services was a violation of right to privacy, the Centre said over 12.64 crore bank accounts were opened using Aadhaar-based e-KYC. "Over 54.25 crore bank accounts have been seeded with Aadhaar as of October 15. Of the newly-opened 30.54 crore Jan Dhan accounts, over 18.97 crore accounts have used Aadhaar," it said.

The country's biggest employment mechanism for daily wagers under MGNREGA too saw a surge in use of Aadhaar, according to statistics provided by the Centre. "Over 9.54 crore active MGNREGA workers of the existing database of 10.93 crore active workers have seeded their Aadhaar numbers and are receiving their daily wages directly in their bank accounts," it said.

"Of a total 2.83 crore pensioners, 1.48 crore have linked Aadhaar to receive pension directly in bank accounts. Over 1.36 crore residents got passport based on Aadhaar authentication. Over 50 crore SIM cards have been issued using Aadhaar e-KYC service. All these are empirical evidence of the working of Aadhaar and is proof of a robust system of financial inclusion and reliability, which gives confidence to people to adopt the system and use it on a large scale," the Centre said.

It added that the petitioners had failed to consider that "total recorded savings to the government of India from just one scheme — direct benefit transfer — on account of Aadhaar was Rs 57,029 crore in three years, 2014 to 2017. "Therefore, there is a clear public interest in ensuring that various benefits, subsidies and services being offered by the government should reach intended beneficiaries and not to fakes and duplicates, which proliferate the system leading to loss of crores of rupees of public money," the Centre said.




The government said linking of Aadhaar with PAN had helped in ensuring "one PAN to one person". "As many as 11.35 lakh cases of duplicate and fraudulent PAN have been detected and accordingly such PANs have been deleted/deactivated. Out of this, around 10.52 lakh cases pertain to individual cases," the Centre said.







"Fake PANs have facilitated enormous growth of shell companies, which were being used for layering of funds and illegal transfer of such funds to other companies/persons or parked abroad in the guise of remittances against import. The share capital of these shell companies are subscribed by fake shareholders through numerous bank accounts with use of fake PAN cards at the initial stage," it said.
TOP COMMENT
I may sound sarcastic but I question what is the meaning of "privacy" or ''Freedom"? In daily life, we do not have freedom even to breath a fresh and clean air. Homes are like match bo... Read More
Sughosh Bansal





The Centre said use of biometrics for establishing identity was not a new phenomenon brought in by Aadhaar.




"Several authorities — for issuance of passport, road transport for driving licences and for property registrations — require biometrics, including fingerprints for issuing relevant documents for verification of identity. For instance, Section 32A of Registration Act mandatorily requires photograph and fingerprints of each buyer and seller where document relates to transfer of ownership of immovable property," it said.