State government has asked to review usage of Aadhaar

The State government has asked all the heads of its departments to review whether use of Aadhaar in their departments fell within the scope of the judgement of the Supreme Court which limited use of the document, primarily to welfare services, benefits and subsidies.In a letter to the heads of departments (HoDs), Principal Secretary of Information Technology Jayesh Ranjan warned that the responsibility of compliance of the order of Supreme Court on Aadhaar shall lie with the respective departments.

General guidelines

The letters were also addressed to the Director General of Police, special chief secretaries, principal secretaries, secretaries, vice-chancellors of universities and chairpersons of Telangana State Council for Higher Education and Telangana State Public Service Commission.

Mr. Jayesh Ranjan enclosed a demi official letter of the Deputy Director General of the regional office of Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) here to Chief Secretary S.K. Joshi seeking issue of guidelines to the State government departments and district collectors that Aadhaar may not be used as proof of date of birth in delivery of welfare services, benefits and subsidies.

“The Aadhaar can be used for establishing identity of an individual subject to authentication and, thereby, per se it is not a proof of date of birth.” The extent to which Aadhaar was to be used should be determined by the implementing agencies, the DO letter said.Earlier, the UIDAI had sent an office memorandum to the secretaries of ministries of the Central government and chief secretaries of State governments that Aadhaar may be used as a proof of identity and address along with other acceptable documents. The same may not be used as proof of date of birth.

Quick identification

The UIDAI observed that the usage of Aadhaar was being interpreted in different ways by various government departments.In this background, Mr. Jayesh Ranjan said many departments in Telangana used Aadhaar for various purposes. Many departments have made Aadhaar mandatory for service delivery as it provided quick, easy and real time method of identification.