Another Challenge for Modi Government as Toddlers fight for their "Aadhaar"

By siliconindia | Tuesday, 05 April 2016, 06:00 Hrs

BANGALORE: From being criticized, to being supported and then being voluntary, Aadhaar Card or Unique Identification (UID) scheme has seen all phases in the BJP timeline. Currently, the Narendra Modi led Government is in support of this scheme as declared by the Centre on 15^th May 2015 and has an ambitious target of 100 percent Aadhaar coverage by mid-2016. The government has taken steady steps towards achieving this target and has been supported well by UIDAI reports Aman Sharma of ET Bureau. But, they have been facing a huge challenge when it comes to enrolling 8 crore toddlers in India under Aadhaar. (A toddler is a child between the ages of one and three)

Reports say that around almost 75 percent of toddlers in the country don’t have an Adhaar number, whdrdrich pegs back the ambitious target of the centre! UIDAI has played a vital role in achieving the target and has launched a big campaign which has accelerated enrolment of 6.2 crore toddlers which fall under their jurisdiction covering 18 states. But the other 11 states which fall under Registrar General of India (RGI) have been left untouched. Reports say that RGI has no mandate to enroll nearly 2 crore toddlers below 5 years of age in the states allotted to it. However, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) will now be bringing a Cabinet note which will seek an expanded mandate for enrolling these toddlers.

According to a top MHA official as told to ET, the note will be ready in 10 days and enrollment of the toddlers in the remaining states will start soon. This comes little late in the day as even if the note is implemented to the earliest, the deadline of June 30, 2016 will still be missed by UIDAI and RGI. To speed-up the process, RGI will now set up camps for parents to bring the toddlers and also go form house-to-house to take their photograph. Enrolment technique will be used by RGI as Aadhaar number of the toddlers is also to be linked with their parents.

The main challenge of making the Aadhar cards of toddlers is to take their photographs as they tend to cry invariably and sometimes don't open their eyes for a click. However, no biometrics like fingerprints or iris will be captured for toddlers that save a lot of time in completing the process. Reports say that only 2.2 crore Aadhaar numbers have been issued so far which is not very satisfactory as there are nearly 11 crore toddlers in India. While government has taken strong steps towards speeding the process, it is still to be seen whether 100 percent Aadhaar coverage will be completed by mid-2016 or not.