With nearly one crore Aadhar’ numbers issued to people across various states, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is gearing up to begin pilot projects for the authentication service by the year-end.
Online authentication, the next step after enrollment, is expected to open up a range of services in areas like banking, telecom and healthcare by helping agencies verify the Aadhar numbers through portable devices. The UIDAI expects to finalise the policy for the authentication infrastructure by September after it completes ongoing proof of concept studies across various devices.
Increasingly, over the next 2-3 years, for a wide variety of products and services across the country, Aadhar will become the basic Know Your Customer,? Nandan Nilekani, UIDAI chairman told software developers at a Nasscom discussion on `Next Generation Service Delivery ? enabled by Aadhar’. In the long term, the authority sees authentication as the project’s most strategic ecosystem because of the potential number of applications that will be developed on the Aadhar platform.
The Aadhar number has already been notified as the basic KYC criteria to open small bank accounts, for purchase of mobile SIM cards and LPG connections, while states like Sikkim and Tripura have notified it as the basic proof of identity and address for all government services.
This is a very important stage for us. We are very comfortable that in the next few months, we will have a critical mass of people around the country who will have the Aadhar numbers with them,? Nilekani said. ?What will happen at that point is that these people who have received this number will then look for the benefits of having it.?
He said the UIDAI is in the process of scaling up its systems to achieve a target of enrolling one million residents every day over the next few months. The authority expects to issue Aadhar numbers to 600 million people in about 3 years.