A review in August revealed that around 1.19 crore under the age of 18 years in Maharashtra are yet to be registered for Aadhar.
The Public health department's hospital at Nagpur will witness the launch of the Government's pilot project which will grant children the unique identity number at birth as part of the Government's effort to universalise and promote Aadhar.
The Aadhaar-linked birth registration project will be linked to the child's birth certificate and will also help those under the age of 18 to register themselves as Aadhar card holders. While the Centre plans to universalise Aadhaar by March 2017, a review in August revealed that around 1.19 crore under the age of 18 years in Maharashtra are yet to be registered for it.
Dr Archana Patil, Additional Director of Health Services, told dna that they would soon launch the Aadhaar-linked birth registration at the public health department's Daga memorial hospital in Nagpur. "Our team conducted pilot testing," she said, adding that they were ready for a rollout. This will be linked to the civil registration system (CRS) which registers births and deaths online. The children will be photographed and their details will be entered using tab-based enrolment kits.
Patil added that the Daga memorial hospital saw around 15000 births take place annually and then planned to eventually cover them under the Aadhaar-linked birth registration process.
To expand this initiative further, more tabs will have to be provided to other hospitals and institutions like district hospitals and primary health centres (PHCs) where births also take place.The state government is also undertaking tablet-based enrolment in government hospitals (district and sub-district hospitals) and the public health department will issue instructions to private institutions for procuring tablets.
A senior public health department official said that "We will take the Aadhaar numbers of the parents and enrol the child. The biometrics of the child will have to be captured at the age of five years and 15 years," stating that the enrolment number (EID) of the child would be recorded in the birth certificate. Details like the name of the child can be updated within the year.
The medical institutions under the ambit of the Maharashtra public health department see around 11 lakh births take place annually. Maharashtra sees around 98% institutional deliveries and the CRS has a reporting efficiency of up to 96% for births and about 20 lakh births were registered in 2015. Sources said there were plans to launch a similar pilot project for Aadhaar-linked birth registration in Mumbai.
A universal roll-out of the unique identity cards will help the Centre's plans to push the trinity of Jan Dhan-Aadhaar and mobile (JAM) to enable social security, delivery of welfare schemes and financial inclusion.
The state government's directorate of information technology has already procured 3929 enrollment kits and plans to deploy 4400 tablets for registration in anganwadis and schools. Around 3900 of these Android-based tabs will be procured for the women and child development department and used in anganwadis.
Maharashtra will establish 4000 permanent enrollment centers (PECs) with one such PEC for every 25000 population in urban areas and one per revenue circle in rural pockets. Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) sources said tabs could also be deployed to cover private hospitals.
Aadhar in numbers
State: Maharashtra
Approximate population: 11.89 crore
Aadhar numbers generated by Mid-August: 90.41%
Registered above 18 years of age: 99.94%
UIDAI Coverage
0-5 years : 41%
5-18 years: 81%
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