The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has been created as an attached office under the Planning Commission. Its role is to develop and implement the necessary institutional, technical and legal infrastructure to issue unique identity numbers to Indian residents.

The vision of the Authority is to issue a unique identification number (UID) that can be verified and authenticated in an online, cost-effective manner, and that is robust enough to eliminate duplicate and fake identities.

The first number would be issued between August 2010 to February 2011. Over five years, the Authority plans to issue 600 million UIDs. The numbers will be issued through various ‘registrar’ agencies across the country.

Features of Aadhaar:

• It’s a 12 digit number – no numbers
• Random numbers – no intelligence
• Standard attributes – no profiling or application information
• All residents including children get number
• Flexible Authentication interface to partner
• Unique authcodes for each request

After the talk of Sanjay Swami, UIDAI about the uniqueness of Unique ID project, Sanjay from central bank of India posed an interesting question…

Q: People from other countries are illegally migrating into India. How can UID prevent such illegal migration? Are you going to provide UID to migrants?

A: UID is not citizenship certificate or a replacement to it. UID is issued based on resident-ship. UID has a concept of introducer. A panchayat or similar official who can introduce an individual. All those who live in India will get it…