Shimla: The Himachal government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) for issuing of unique identity numeric code to all residents of the state.
In the presence of chief secretary Asha Swarup, director general of UIDAI, RS Sharma and Ajay Tyagi, principal secretary finance Himachal government signed the MoU.
On the occasion Sharma said that the Universal Identification (UID) number would be given to all residents and children above five years of age.
The UID, identifies individual uniqueness on the basis of their demographic information and biometrics will give the mean to clearly establish their identity to public or private agencies offering different services across the country.
Government agencies would be the registrars for enrolling residents who would be issued a micro ATM like card containing 16 digit numeric code.
UID number can play a vital role in enabling access to formal financial mechanism by helping poor to easily authenticate their identity to financial institutions for money transactions of any other service provider.
The greater benefit is that all other identity documents would not be required, once the numeric code is assigned to all the residents of the state and country as well.
Chief Secretary Asha Swarup asked for linking up UID on pilot basis with MNREGA, Social Security Pension and Public Distribution Sector (PDS).
It would facilitate wage payments for labourers and disbursing pensions. Should a pensioner moves out of village to reside elsewhere, the UID numeric would enable them to access their money anywhere and is effective, authentic and confidential manner, providing easy access to poor people for any financial transactions without going through the repeated exercise of proving identity at different levels.
The UID number would be operative by sensing iris through camera or finger prints of the person and would be legally valid.
Others present on the occasion included secretary food and civil supplies Anil Khachi, secretary rural development RD Dhiman, director IT Subhasish Panda, director census Balbir Tegta, and SIO, NIC Rajesh Bahadur were present on the occasion
As Editor, Ravinder Makhaik leads a team of media professionals at Hill Post.
Spanning a career of over two decades in mass communication, as a Documentary Filmmaker, TV journalist, Print Media journalist and with Online & Social Media, he brings with him a vast experience. He lives in Shimla.
