Mera Aadhaar Meri Pehchan

Identity proof in Kashmir is mandatory. FilmmakerRahat Kazmi released IdentityCard—Ek Lifeline in 2014 on how it holds the keyimportance in the vale. We are living in an abnormal place.

It all happened a few years before. South Kashmirwas submerged in troubled waters. North was abuzz. Loudspeakers were used to assemblethe villagers on fixed venues for Aadhar Enrolment. Beeline of villagers rushed.It was fall. Villagers were busy in apple-picking and harvesting of kharifcrops. The team started fingerprinting and scanning people’s pupil. Men came indroves and girls gossiping on the far end, women chattering about this new but enforcedentity.

   

The linking of Aadhar, the 16 –digitbiometric ID issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UDID),with various services like PAN, Bank Account, Mobile Number, UAN issued by theEmployers Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) have been questioned. Privacy diedan embarrassing death when it was introduced. State’s largest lender, SBI, havealleged that the data of UIDAI has been misused. Our private data is public andvulnerable to misuse.  Word of Mouth (WoM)spread that no benefits can be availed without Aadhar card. Finally, half ayear passed, my family received the much-awaited cards except me. Luck neverfavoured me. I was disappointed.  It was considereda holy entity till the Apex Court reduced its status.

Aadhar has been used for a wide range ofpurposes – carrying out land transfers, procuring passports, getting loans,casting votes, obtaining other IDs, siphoning off ration grains, from schooladmissions to getting marriage certificates to paying taxes to taking newmobile connections, from getting pension to get a subsidy of your gas cylinder,linking Aadhar and PAN and both linking with the bank, it touched the newfacets of people’s lives as it became the default identifier.

 Lastmonth, Economic Times carried thishair-raising story of a French researcher who found a major security lapse thatElliot Alderson has found that Aadhardata of 6.7 million dealers/distributors have been leaked. The genuine holdersof Aadhar have subsequently found themselves in a soup when they were told thatloans in their name were not honoured or land transfers in their name werecarried out without consent. Even a Member of Parliament, Shamsher Singh Dullo,lost INR 27,000 after revealing an Aadhar one-time-password (OTP) to fraudstersover phone. The Supreme Court has clearly mentioned that no private entity canask for Aadhar and government can’t disclose the details of an individual onthe grounds of national security.

The insignificance of this Aadhar can wellbe imagined that Aadhar is designed to be a number, not a card. In fact, theword ‘card’ does not figure even once in the Aadhar Act. At Jaipur LiteraryFestival, Oxford dictionaries officially announced ‘Aadhar’ as Hindi word ofthe year for 2017. Press release from oxford university press stated that”Aadhar” has attracted a great deal of attention and reflects the ethos, moodor preoccupations of the year.

As I mentioned earlier, there was a surgeand urge for an Aadhar card. Necessity is truly the mother of invention. Anurgent assignment pressed me to open a bank account as New Year dawned, bankerspolitely refused that they need Aadhar card or at least an enrolment number. Ihad none. It was 2015. I went to meet District executive of Baramulla the nextday. I was directed to meet UDID team. One of the operators told me to visit aparticular computer learning centre where I had to pay INR 500 to get anincorrect enrolment slip. My hurried visits to DC office bore no fruit.  A year passed. 2016 agitation intensified. Ibadly needed this ‘mandatory’ piece of paper.

In August 2017, I learned that some sevenmiles away from my locality is an Aadhar enrolment centre. I quickly moved.  Finally, after a gap of three years, I receivedan incorrect Aadhar card against a payment of INR 100.

Blurred snap, misspelled name, wrong D.O.B, mismatched address and untrue PIN is what defined my card. Surprisingly, the name of another revenue village was mingled with ours. The given Postal Index Number doesn’t even exist.

J&K Bank came to my rescue. Some designated business units of this financial Institution were earmarked for Aadhar updation. In 2018, I travelled to Srinagar and reached Saidakadal branch of the bank. I submitted a Xerox copy of my PRC and DoB issued by the First Class Magistrate, paid INR 25 and corrected the aforementioned changes.

Last year, the wire reported that regular reports of data leaks have raised doubts about the reliability of the data-security infrastructure. Even Country’s apex court declared its validity null and void. Sunil Abraham tossed a brilliant question as to when assessing a technology don’t ask — “what use it is being put to today?” Instead ask “what use can it be put to tomorrow and by whom?” Biometrics allows for identification of citizens even when they don’t want to be identified.

If the UIDAI adopts smart cards, we can destroy the centralized database of biometrics just like the UK government did in 2010 under Theresa May’s tenure as Home Secretary.

During the Aadhar verdict, Justice DYChandrachud disagreed with the bench on some issues. Viz: Seeding mobile phonewith Aadhar is a grave threat to liberty and autonomy. Aadhar allows profilingof individuals, violates privacy.

Few fortnights back, I was told that PIN of an Aadhar can be changed at Baramulla head post office.  There, I was told that the “system” is defunct for couple of weeks. Even after five years of trials, I could not get a correct Aadhar card. UIDAI was supposed to deliver it for free at my postal address but I am the unluckiest soul on the planet earth.

Feedback: universalbaba99@gmail.com

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