Lining up a nation
The Man Nandan Nilekani
The Mission
To provide an identity card to each Indian
What’s the Big Deal?
It is the world’s largest biometric identity card project. The database will cover as many as 1.16 billion people. Project cost Rs. 20,000 crore.
Why We Need It
It will help take social security and banking services to the under-served population. It will also weed out illegal immigrants.
The Challenge
To scale up technology, devices and processes to develop it and keep it running
What Can He Do?
Nilekani’s networking skills and ability to build consensus on divisive issues will come in handy.
People to Watch
Tata Consultancy, Infosys, Wipro, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, HCL, 3i Infotech and IL&FS Technologies are likely to bid for the project
Budget Highlights
Pranab Mukherjee (“This project is very close to my heart.”) has set aside Rs. 120 crore for the project; promised to deliver the first cards in 12-18 months
Past Mistakes
Recent attempts to create a citizen database have failed. The National Democratic Alliance government headed by A.B. Vajpayee launched the Multipurpose National Identity Card (MNIC) project as a way to tackle illegal immigration. It ignored citizen databases like the Election Commission’s voter list (unreliable because politicians had got illegal immigrants into the list as a quid pro quo for votes) and the Census report (no photo proof). The MNIC project’s main objective was to establish nationality.
The pilot project, in which only about 12 lakh cards were issued against a target of 20 lakh, was wrapped up and nothing was heard about MNIC after that. Ernst & Young (E&Y) was a consultant to the project in which public sector entities like Bharat Electronics played the main role.
Why was MNIC given a silent burial?
Not just because the government changed at the centre. The blame, says an expert who wishes to remain anonymous, lay with the MNIC’s focus on just establishing nationality which went well with BJP’s politics. The United Progressive Alliance government of Manmohan Singh did not want to sustain that image of a police state ahead of the 2009 elections. It is now driving the Unique Identity Project (UID), with a focus on taking civic and business services to the under-served people.
Experts who track biometric card technology say MNIC was designed badly. Initially, prints from only a few fingers of an applicant were taken. This worked well when the numbers were small, but started spouting duplicate results when more people were covered. The only way a biometric project will work in India is to take prints of all 10 fingers. Adding other records such as iris scans could make it more efficient.
(This story appears in the 17 July, 2009 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)
a really challenging task...i hope it is successfully consummated and not left mid-way...intent seems to be there as Nilekani has been given full authority to implement it...
on Jul 14, 2009