Nimish Sawant

The debate around Aadhaar is alive and kicking. While we have seen how Aadhaar is being used to ensure benefits are disbursed to the actual beneficiaries without middlemen, thereby reducing leakages, there are also a lot of concerns around the way Aadhaar data is being used. In the last six to eight months, we have been coming across many news items which tell us how Aadhaar is being mandatory in many areas of life - PAN card registration, railway bookings, e-KYC for telcos, merchant payments and more.

Recently a post on Medium, pointed out to four issues with Aadhaar among which one was pertaining to how even though Aadhaar is not a proof of citizenship, one could use it for obtaining other things. "Aadhaar is not a proof of citizenship, but it can be used to either apply for a passport, or obtain other identity documents which can then be used to apply for a passport."

It is well known that Passport office accepts Aadhaar as a means of providing proof of residence and photo identity - purposes which are debatable. In this FAQ, to the question on the Passport India website, "I am a self employed person and have recently shifted to Bangalore from Delhi. I want to apply for a passport on Tatkaal basis, but I don't have any address proof. What should I do?" the Passport Seva Kendra mentions Aadhaar Card as an option.

According to Aadhaar Bill, the Aadhaar number is only meant to be used as a 'proof of identity' and there is no mention of 'proof of address'. But according to the Passport Seva Kendra website, Aadhaar Card is enlisted as an acceptable document for address proof.

If one is using only Aadhaar card to register for a fresh passport, the Aadhaar card holder still has to be present at the Passport office. So authentication and validation layer is still there thanks to a personal interview with the Passport office staff.

But say there is are illegal immigrants who are not legal citizens of the country, but who have been living here for years. They have all the necessary proofs such as address, bills, and so on to prove that they are living in India. If they have been living unnoticed for years, one would assume they have access to entities who can forge documents. If they then get an Aadhaar number, what stops them from applying for a Passport and becoming a legal citizen? The Passport after all is a legal document pertaining to your citizenship.

But like we said, that is only assuming one has access to professional counterfeiters. The simple reason being, that if you are applying for an Aadhaar card, you need to have documents which offer proof of date of birth, proof of relation documents, proof of address (with name and photo) and proof of identity (with name and photo). Here is the whole list of the accepted documents.

It seems unlikely then that forging all those details while applying for an Aadhaar card is possible. We are not saying it is impossible. A determined crook, could find success. But majority of the applicants will need legit documentation. So the application process for Aadhaar does take measures on paper. The weak link at times could also be the staff that is checking those documents, there could be a hundred different variables where things could go wrong at the ground level.

But to claim that getting a citizenship using Aadhaar is a very easy process, is also taking things to the extreme.

Aadhaar database is still secure and according to cyberlaw expert Prashant Mali, the databases available on Google searchers “are not a major cause for concern.” Mali goes on to point out that, “criminals can potentially abuse a leak in the Aadhaar biometric data”, but that data has not been breached.

Rajesh Bansal, senior advisor at BFA and former assistant director general at UIDAI, had also told us in the past that till now, there hasn’t been a single case of any compromise on the central Aadhaar database.

So yes, concerns pertaining to privacy are there. But it is safe to say that the system has certain checks and balances in place, to ensure that it isn't very easy to fool it.