Raghottam Koppar By

Express News Service

GADAG: Every night, villagers of Ron in Gadag district gather their beds, pillows, butti (meals) and shawls and sleep in front of an SBI Bank. At 4 am, sipping hot tea from flasks, they form a queue in order to get their Aadhaar cards. This has become a daily routine for the villagers ever since know your customer (KYC) became mandatory everywhere and Aadhaar became mandatory to avail any facility from government.

Ron is located about 41 km from Gadag. It has two Aadhaar card centres. The tahsildar’s office, which was a centre, is closed due to some technical problems, leaving the SBI office as the only centre. Though the centre opens at 10.30 am, server problems delay the process of verification and registration. “Sometimes the server is down and sometimes the fingerprints are not clear. Hence, the process is delayed. So to get an Aadhaar as fast as possible, villagers sleep in front of the bank,” said a bank official.

That is not the only problem the bank faces. It is also facing a shortage of staff for the process.

Nagappa Jiddibagil, a villager from Jakkali said, “We wait in long queues from early morning. Our turn comes late as the staff always say there is one problem or the other. I have been in queue from early morning on Monday and I may reach the staff by Wednesday.”

Prajwal Byali, a resident of Ron, said, “The server is always down and the staff go for tea or coffee if the server is down. People are suffering in queues. Women and the elderly sit in queues with their kids. The officials concerned should solve the issue by opening two or three centres in Ron.”

Ron tahsildar Sharanamma Kaari said, “It has come to my notice that villagers are sleeping in front of SBI. I have enquired. There is a technical problem which will be solved in two days”.