The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has completed issuance of 51 crore Aadhaar numbers. With generation of about 11 lakh Aadhaar numbers every day, the flagship programme appears all set to complete its mandate of covering 60 crore population in the next few months. The process to issue unique identity number came into force in 2009.
A number of regulatory authorities such as Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) have declared Aadhaar number as a valid ‘know your customer’ (KYC) and ‘electronically know your customer’ (eKYC) for purposes under their respective domains. This has led to Aadhaar being leveraged not only as a tool for financial inclusion and empowerment. More than four crore Aadhaar number holders have so far linked their bank accounts.
With its capability of usage in re-engineering of Government processes, Aadhaar numbers have been leveraged in implementation of several programmes/ schemes of Central and State Governments, including the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) introduced on a phase-wise basis for 28 Central Sector schemes in 121 districts of the country, and Direct Benefit Transfer for liquefied Petroleum Gas (DBTl) in 95 districts.
Districts with high level of Aadhaar saturation have been chosen for implementation initially, andover 1500 crore rupees have already been transferred over the Aadhaar Payment Bridge (APB) in more than 2.8 crore transactions under DBT and DBTl. As many as 156 banks, including a number of co-operative and rural banks, are currently participating on the APB platform.