UID: Nothing to hide, nothing to fear?
As the UID virus has the nation in its grip, there is talk of greater accountability and transparency.
It is interesting to note, however, that most government officials speaking on the topic to newspapers want to remain anonymous, says SHILPA NARANI
It is ironic that the 12 digit Unique Identification number (UID) which is being given to every citizen of the country to make them more accountable and transparent, has not encouraged persons who are associated with the government that is promoting this scheme, to become transparent themselves.
A study based on articles pertaining to the IUD issue published by leading newspapers in the country revealed that a vast majority of those who spoke on the topic wanted to remain anonymous. The study encompassed newspapers like the Times of India, the Indian Express, the Hindustan Times, and its supplement LiveMint, Business Standard, Asian Age, DNA India, Bangalore Mirror, Deccan Chronicle and Deccan Herald.
A pan-India project to “identify” each resident was formally inaugurated in 2009, with the establishment of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) as an office attached to the Planning Commission. The goal of the project is to issue a unique identity number to every resident in the country. It means that if you misplace the document or it is stolen, then you do not have an identity in the country. The UID will be linked to every resident’s basic demographic and biometric details and stored in the UIDAI central database.
An identity card virus seems to be spreading across India and everyone, led by Sonia Gandhi, is all praise for the initiative. I researched 53 articles from which i observed that there are 72 anonymous people and only 34 people who revealed their name. Most of these individuals were public servants who did not wish to be identified. One individual was from the department of information technology, who is working on the UID project and with the UIDAI itself.
Total Anonymous
As one can see from the graph above, the total number of anonymous people sharing their perspectives on the UID are more than the total number of identified people sharing their perspective.
TheTimes of Indiapublished 13 articles on the topic and nine of their sources, who included HRD officials, civic sources, sources from census operation department, collectorate, senior postal officials, UIDAI officials and unclassified individuals, chose to be anonymous. The newspaper only quoted four identified sources.
In 10 articles on the topic the Indian Express quoted 16 official sources including senior officials of the AADHAR office, senior Delhi government officials and some unclassified sources and only four agreed to give their names.
Live Minthad 7 articles with 15 anonymous sources including those from the Information Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA), UIDAI, Bank of India, a senior SEBI official and ministerial sources. Only 11 sources revealed their identity.
Hindustan Timespublished three articles on the topic with 6 anonymous and five named sources. The former were from UIDAI, finance ministry, and other government offices.
The 11 articles published by Deccan Herald had 14 anonymous sources and six named ones. Anonymous sources included UIDAI officials and officials of nationalised banks. Asian Agepublished 4 articles with 5 anonymous sources.
UID has the potential to take away an individual’s ability to remain anonymous in society and it seeks to introduce transparency. If that is the case the government should ensure that it practices what it preaches by introducing transparency in its own operations.
I am indebted to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, Center for Internet & Society, under whose supervision I did my research.