Government ties EPF account to Aadhaar

If you haven’t got your Aadhaar number yet, get around to applying for it soon. Else, getting an employees’ provident fund (EPF) account will not be possible. The government has issued a notice making it mandatory for people to furnish their Aadhaar numbers at the time of opening EPF accounts.

“It has been decided to make Aadhaar numbers mandatory for new members... joining on or after March 1, 2013. However for existing members, the seeding of Aadhaar number has to done in a time-bound manner,” an official order to the field staff said.

The move aims at getting more people to apply for their Aadhaar card. In case, an employee does not have the Aadhaar number, the employer can issue an enrolment ID as per the guidelines of the employees’ provident fund organisation (EPFO). This enrolment ID will be converted to their Aadhaar number later on, the order said.

Over 50 million existing EPFO subscribers will be required to furnish their Aadhaar numbers to the body by June 30 this year, as it has decided to use Aadhaar as a mandatory know your customer credential to provide better services.