Assam to filly climb on Aadhaar bandwagon

Dispur to roll out UID cards, committee formed to oversee implementation

BY OUR STAFF REPORTER

Guwahati, July 20: Filly, after eight years since the project took off tiolly, Assam is all set to roll out Unique Identification (UID) cards – more commonly referred to as Aadhaar cards – to the residents of the State.

Aadhaar is a 12-digit unique-identity number issued to all Indian residents.

A committee christened as the State Aadhaar Implementation Committee and headed by the State’s Chief Secretary as its Chairperson has been constituted for the purpose, with heads of key government departments like Fince, Home & Political, Panchayat & Rural Development (P&RD), Revenue & Disaster Magement, etc, as its members.

The committee has been tasked with the responsibility of coorditing, monitoring and resolving issues relating to the UID project, approval of action plan for successful implementation of the project and providing authenticated lists of villages, panchayats, individuals and families enrolled under various schemes like MGNREGA and any other database that may be relevant for the project.

Meanwhile, the committee has held two meetings already, including one here on Thursday, which deliberated on engagement of enrolment agencies for executing the project, besides floating a request for proposal (RFP).

The entire cost of executing the UID in Assam will be borne by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), as being done in parts of the country.

The General Administration Department (GAD) has already been appointed as the nodal agency or registrar to oversee the roll-out of Aadhaar cards in the State by the Sarbanda Sonowal government. The GAD has already started communicating with the UIDAI on the matter.

The government hopes to enroll at least 50% of the State’s population by April 2018 for the Aadhaar cards, source said.

The latest move of Dispur assumes significance since the UID roll-out process was stalled in the State after several organisations raised their objections to it, citing that the cards will become another document for illegal migrants to prove their citizenship. The organisations demanded that the process be started only after update of the tiol Register of Citizens (NRC), which is being done under the Supreme Court’s supervision, is complete.

However, the current dispensation at Dispur studied the matter in depth and found that the objections were not based on facts. The sources referred to Clause 9 of the notification for UID issued by the Centre to justify the State government’s decision.

Clause 9 states: “The Aadhaar number of the authentication thereof shall not, by itself, confer any right of or the proof of citizenship or domicile in respect of an Aadhaar number holder.”

Currently, only 7% of the State’s population has been covered under the UID, which is the lowest in the country. This has led to deprivation of a large chunk of the State’s population from a number of benefits being offered under various government schemes, including new LPG connection, scholarships, MGNREGA, etc.

“Under such circumstances, the State government has decided to go ahead with rolling out of Aadhaar cards in Assam. The people of the State should not be deprived from benefits being provided by the Centre in a number of schemes in the rest of the country,” the sources added.

It may be recalled that the Tarun Gogoi government had initially entrusted the P&RD Department with the task of rolling out Aadhaar cards in the State, before making the Home & Political Department responsible for it.