Aadhaar: on a platform of myths 2


R. Ramakumar, Associate Professor with the Tata Institute of Social Sciences in Mumbai, writes in The Hindu comparing India’s ID card project with the last Labour governments’:

Two countries. Two pet projects of the respective Prime Ministers. Unmistakable parallels in the discourse. “The case for ID cards is a case not about liberty, but about the modern world,” wrote Tony Blair in November 2006, as he was mobilising support for his Identity Cards Bill, 2004. “Aadhaar…is symbolic of the new and modern India,” said Manmohan Singh in September 2010, as he distributed the first Aadhaar number in Nandurbar. “What we are trying to do with identity cards is make use of the modern technology,” said Mr. Blair. “Aadhaar project would use today’s latest and modern technology,” said Dr. Singh. The similarities are endless.

Mr. Blair’s celebrated push for identity cards ended in a political disaster for Labour. The British people resisted the project for over five years. Finally, the Cameron government scrapped the Identity Cards Act in 2010, thus abolishing identity cards and plans for a National Identity Register. On the other hand, India is enthusiastically pushing the Aadhaar, or unique identity (UID), project. The UID project has been integrated with the Home Ministry’s National Population Register (NPR). The “National Identification Authority of India Bill” has been tabled in Parliament. Globally, observers of identity policies are watching if India learns anything from the “modern” world.


2 thoughts on “Aadhaar: on a platform of myths

  • Mr Ecks

    The country that invented non-violent resistence (and has millions of villagers who are are much harder to nobble than the “off to jail and lose yer job” westerners) should fuck ’em up nicely.

    Note to crims: with nearly 2 billion people to process, time to set yourself up with a couple of hundred false Indian IDs.

  • Mr Ecks

    The country that invented non-violent resistence (and has millions of villagers who are are much harder to nobble than the “off to jail and lose yer job” westerners) should fuck ’em up nicely.

    Note to crims: with nearly 2 billion people to process, time to set yourself up with a couple of hundred false Indian IDs.

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