Manmohan Singh to launch UID drive in Maharashtra by September-end

The ambitious Unique Identification (UID) drive, now christened as Adhar, will kick start from a village in Nandurbar. Prime minister Manmohan Singh will inaugurate the pilot project at Tembhali village in Shahada tehsil in Nandurbar either on 29 or 30 September. 

After Maharashtra was chosen for the launch of Adhar, the information technology department is all set to roll the scheme into motion. A workshop for the officials from the revenue department was conducted at the collector’s office in Mumbai on Friday.  

With a population of 1,098, Tembhali will go for the biometric enumeration soon after the inauguration by the prime minister.
“We are fully prepared for the roll out of the national programme. Our state UID programme is being implemented between November 1, 2010 and March 31, 2011. However, the procedure will be rolled out soon after the launch of the pilot project,” said Nitin Karir, secretary, information technology. 

The 12-digit Adhar number will be mandatory for all the government schemes and will serve as the unique identification number as the citizen of the country. “The citizens are required to produce any one of the 29 listed documents as the proof of domicile in the country. If none of the document is produced, the district collector in rural areas and municipal commissioners in the urban areas are authorised to issue a certificate of identity. However the officers issuing such certificates will be responsible in proving the domicile of the person,” said an official from Mantralaya.