Data on birth, death certificates, property tax, building permissions and trade licence to be integrated

Chennai Corporation is planning to integrate Aadhaar with various civic services, including birth and death certificates, property tax assessment, trade licence and building approval.

Over the past few years, there have been many instances of residents complaining to the Chennai Corporation Commissioner whenever zonal level officials asked residents to produce Aadhaar for civic services. Former councillors have also been complaining to senior officials that zonal level officials were reportedly harassing residents, demanding Aadhaar. A few years ago, former Commissioner Vikram Kapur had even warned zonal level officials of action for demanding Aadhaar from residents for civic services.

Now, the situation seems to be changing. Following a meeting on the State Resident Data hub held on October 23, senior officials have informed zonal level officials that database integration of Aadhaar may be carried out to “ensure the authenticity of the individuals availing themselves of civic services”.

“To validate the correctness of data entered in birth and death, all taxation and all other types of public service related information, integration of UID data will be carried out,” said an official of the Corporation.

Integration of Aadhaar data with modules, such as birth and death, taxation and public related information, will lead to proper authentication of the citizen demographic information. “This will also integrate Greater Chennai Corporation data with other departments,” said the official.

Data available with the Corporation from 1934 will be covered initially. The birth registration details are available for 69,05,698 residents. Death registration details are available for 29,15,701 residents. Property Tax Assessment data on 12,05,666 residents, profession tax assessment data of 1,22,766 residents, company tax assessment data of 16,036 residents, trade licence data of 53,006 residents, town planning data of 2,177 residents in old system and town planning data of 1,713 residents online will be integrated with Aadhaar.

Council decision

“For Aadhaar linkage, Greater Chennai Corporation has to enrol as a sub authentication user agency,” said an official.

Currently, the Tamil Nadu e governanace Agency (TNeGA) is functioning as an authentication user agency. To enrol as a sub authentication user agency, a joint undertaking has to be signed by the civic body. The application of sub authentication user agency under Regulation 15 of Aadhaar (Authentication) Regulations, 2016 will be submitted shortly. The Corporation Special Officer’s Council has decided to send a letter to TNeGA for authorising the Chennai Corporation as a sub authentication user agency, said an official.

Former DMK Councillor Deva Jawahar said any decision on Aadhaar should be taken only after discussing the problems faced by residents at the new Corporation Council.

“Many officials seem to be unable to understand all the aspects of the problems faced by residents. So the Special Officer’s Council of the Chennai Corporation Commissioner should not take such major decisions without a debate,” said Mr. Jawahar.