The Hindu Business Line : Unique ID project to decide on ‘biometric set’ soon

Mr Nandan Nilekani, Chairman, Unique Identification Authority of India, at a public lecture on ‘Unique Identification Project - Issues and Challenges,’ at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore on Thursday.

Our Bureau

Bangalore, Nov. 12 The Unique Identification Project is expected to decide soon on the “biometric set” or the identification markers it will use to issue a unique number to each individual.

Mr Nandan Nilekani, Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India, said here on Thursday that the committee set up to look into the subject would decide on how to use fingerprints, iris mapping, face and DNA samples so that the uniqueness of each individual’s features is captured.

He was speaking on the subject of ‘Unique Identification Project — Issues and Challenges,’ at the Indian Institute of Science, on the occasion of the platinum jubilee celebrations of the Indian Science Academy.

Elaborating on the project’s deadlines, Mr Nilekani said that the first unique identification number, or UID, is slated to be issued within 12-18 months from August, while 600 million will be covered within four years from that date.

Purpose

The purpose of the project, Mr Nilekani said, was to “issue a number for everyone” or 1.2 billion people. With social welfare programmes increasingly meant for individual beneficiaries, the programme is meant to “provide for online ID verification,” he said, adding that “this is a big deal as underlying databases are full of duplicates and ghosts.” “The challenge in public governance is the last mile,” he said.

Mr Nilekani elaborated that the purpose of the UID project was to provide for “basic verification” or “know your resident,” so that the individual’s identity is confirmed.

The name, date of birth, father’s name and mother’s name will be the basic “demographic fields” that will be sought. He said that no information will be sought on “profiling attributes, income level, religion and transaction records.” The system will be “minimalistic in design,” he elaborated.

Online verification

On the process of online verification, the Chairman of the UID Authority said that a combination of a wireless or wire instrument and fingerprint reader would be used for the purpose.

Citing an example, he said that a mobile phone and fingerprint reader would cost Rs 5,000 and can be used by the business correspondent of a bank or a kirana shop. Addressing concerns over privacy, he said that the instrument concerned would verify the identity of the individual concerned by transmitting a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ message. Mr Nilekani said that a way would have to be found to transmit the fingerprint images.

Mr Nilekani said that “the scale of the project is the biggest challenge,” as the biggest such project that has so far been attempted is just a tenth of this size. It will be implemented through “multiple registrars” such as the State Government, banks, insurance companies and oil companies. He said that “uniform registration process” would be put in place across the country.

Mr Nilekani said that the system is a “self-cleaning” one, as both the people and the registrars “will have an incentive to reduce transaction costs” by obtaining basic verification through a single process.

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