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'How many Muslims and Dalits?' Asaduddin Owaisi slams UIDAI over notice to 127 people in Hyderabad

Slamming the UIDAI, Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi said the agency did not follow due procedure and abused its powers which has resulted in panic among people.

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AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi
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AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Wednesday slammed the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) for issuing notices to 127 individuals living in Hyderabad on Aadhaar card issue and alleged the agency did not follow rules.

According to reports, the UIDAI has asked at least 127 people in Hyderabad to prove their 'Indian citizenship', warning that their Aadhar cards will be cancelled if they don't verify their enrolment documents in person. The UIDAI has, however, clarified that its Hyderabad office sent notices to 127 people for allegedly obtaining Aadhaar numbers on "false pretences" but asserted these had nothing to do with citizenship.

Slamming the UIDAI, the Hyderabad MP said the agency did not follow due procedure and abused its powers which has resulted in panic among people.

"First, UIDAI has no power to verify citizenship. It has few powers to look into some cases of Aadhaar being granted incorrectly (rules 27 & 28)," Owaisi tweeted.

"The Deputy Director in this case made it about verifying citizenship - which they aren’t empowered to do. The identical notices don’t even provide any specific findings of the preliminary inquiry that has to be made. Notices don’t even say what these “false pretences” were," he said. 

The Lok Sabha MP also requested the Telangana Police and UIDAI to reveal the number of Muslims and Dalits in the list of 127 people who were issued notices.

"Which police officer provided you with this information? @UIDAI Can @TelanganaDGP confirm if they shared a list of 127 names with UIDAI? Can they tell us on what grounds? Since UIDAI has now shifted the responsibility to @TeanganaPolice it is their responsibility to clear the air," he said in another tweet. 

"The words used in the notice is verification of citizenship (not validity of aadhaar). So will @UIDAI suspend the Deputy Director who issued this notice? They clearly exceeded their powers by issuing this notice, It was a bad faith & biased exercise of their powers," he added. 

"UIDAI did not follow due procedure & abused its powers. The result was (understandable) panic among people," he said.

On Tuesday, a rickshaw driver named Sattar Khan was asked to appear before a UIDAI official on February 20 “with all necessary documents in original to prove all his claims of Indian citizenship”. The letter went viral on social media.

“If you are not an Indian national, prove that you have entered the territory of India legally and your stay is valid,” the notice, served under Rule 30 (Chapter VI) of Aadhaar (Enrolment and Update) Regulations, 2016, said. It also mentions a “complaint/objection” against Khan's enrolment, without naming the person who raised it.

After the notice made headlines, the UIDAI defended itself saying that Telangana police has informed its Hyderabad office that 127 people obtained Aadhaar “on false pretences” and were illegal immigrants.

“In the said notice/s, the residents in Hyderabad, 127 in number, were asked to appear before the deputy director on 20th February for a personal hearing. Since it may take them some more time to collect their original documents that they had submitted for obtaining Aadhaar, as informed by the state police, the UIDAI has postponed the personal hearing to May 2020,” the agency said.

“...Aadhaar has got nothing to do with the citizenship issue as such. Aadhaar is not a document of citizenship and UIDAI has been mandated under the Aadhaar Act to ascertain residency of a person in India for 182 days prior to applying for Aadhaar. Also, the Supreme Court of India in its landmark decision has directed UIDAI not to issue Aadhaar to illegal immigrants,” it added.

Notably, the development comes at a time when the country is rocked by protests against the recently amended citizenship law and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC).

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