Dear Comrades,
PANAJI: The involvement of central and state government departments in the enrollment of 'Aadhaar'-unique identification ( UID)-has left citizens confused.
While the postal department, a central government agency, recently announced enrollment at its PO-Panaji, Calangute, Margao and Mapusa branches, the Goa government on Monday announced the involvement of its planning and statistics department in the exercise.
The latter is expected to set up 55 centres across the state. Dismissing the confusion, officials overseeing the scheme's implementation in Goa told TOI on Wednesday that citizens need to register with any one registrar/centre, irrespective of which government it falls under.
They added that a list of the 55 state-government enrollment centres will be announced in the media shortly. These centres will conduct the exercise over a period of 150 days, including on Saturdays, officials said.
The postal department too is expected to announce its remainder 21 enrollment centres soon.
"There is no confusion. Anyone who has enrolled at either a central or state registrar and who has had his/her biometric details (fingerprints, iris scan and photograph) recorded, will receive an acknowledgement slip issued by the unique identification authority of India (UIDAI).
They then need not register anywhere else," said Vijay B Saxena, joint director, department of planning, statistics and evaluation, Goa. He added that once enrolled, the citizen's data is directly uploaded onto the UIDAI's central database where it will be sorted. "Only after the data has been sorted will the citizen receive a unique identity number followed by the Aadhaar 12-digit card. This will ensure that there is no duplication," Saxena stressed.
The Aadhaar card, once issued, can be used as a photo-identity proof-it will bear the citizen's name, sex, age, address-and for all interactions with the government, especially with regard to schemes and claims, he said. As for the state's 55 centres, an employee has been deputed at each centre to help senior citizens, the disabled and children, Saxena said.
timesofindia.com TNN | Aug 11, 2011, 02.12AM IST
