[Urbanstudy] BIG BROTHER WATCHES

[Vinay Baindur]

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1101222/jsp/opinion/story_13332047.jsp




*BIG BROTHER WATCHES *
  Citizens’ groups are up in arms over the recently introduced National
Identification Authority of India Bill. *Manjula Sen* finds out why.     Person
or number?: A unique identity number will be provide to each Indian citizen
by the UIDAI.

The National Identification Authority of India Bill (NIAI), 2010, was
introduced in the Rajya Sabha early this month, nearly two years after the
Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) was set up in February
2009. The UIDAI intends to provide a unique number to each resident in the
country, a number which will “primarily be used as a basis for efficient
delivery of welfare services.” Towards this end, a biometrics-based database
of every Indian citizen would be maintained by the government.

The UIDAI was established by an executive order of the Union government,
with its chairman Nandan Nilekani handpicked for the Cabinet minister-ranked
job by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The pilot project called Aadhaar
rolled out in September this year. The NIAI Bill is essentially aimed at
making the UIDAI a legally sanctioned body and setting out its powers and
functions.

Though the law is obviously necessary, several legal experts and citizens’
groups say that the bill leaves a lot to be desired. One major point of
concern is that the bill does not offer enough safeguards against breach of
privacy, profiling and “function creep”, the process where data collected
for one function may end up being used for another purpose. In fact, the
draft bill had called for checks against profiling, but this has been
ignored entirely in is current version.

Again the bill does not clearly specify whom the ID number will be
applicable to. It says the number would be given to “individuals residing in
India and certain other classes of individuals.” Critics say that the term
“certain other classes” is too vague and ambiguous to be acceptable.

In a detailed critique, the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), a
Bengaluru-based research and advocacy group, says that the term is a broad
generalisation that lends itself to potential misuse. Narrowing the term to
“individuals residing in India” would be much better, it argues.

CIS also points out that the bill seems to do more with the regulatory
authority of the UIDAI rather than with measures to protect the rights and
interests of citizens. “Lots of important details have been left to be
defined by the UIDAI. This is dangerous because it affords it far too much
discretionary powers. The bill only protects the interests of the UIDAI. It
does not protect the rights of citizens and residents,” stresses Sunil
Abraham, executive director, CIS.

Again, the proposed law does not contain adequate measures to redress
transactional and system errors or fraud. Possible fraud scenarios include
the misrepresentation of information, multiple registrations by the same
resident, registration for non-existent residents, and so on.

Others point out that the loose language and intermixing of terms in the
bill pose the threat that data will be collected and used for purposes other
than those stated. The devil is in the detail, says Pratiksha Mehta, legal
counsel for a consumer retailer. “The language of the bill is very generic,
leaving scope for loopholes in the way data is accumulated and shared,” she
says.

Another cause for concern is that the bill holds only the UIDAI accountable
for violations. Rather, say critics, it needs to hold enrolling agencies
(those that collect data), registrars, and other service providers entrusted
with the job of collecting information accountable. Furthermore, the bill
does not specify how enrolling agencies will be appointed. Nor is there any
provision to penalise data collectors for misusing or sharing data. “There
is zero data protection provision in the bill,” says Abraham.

Of course, the bill has its supporters too. They point out that it is
actually an improvement on its draft version in some aspects. For instance,
it now expressly prohibits the dissemination of any information that is
stored in the Central Identities Data Repository (a centralised data base of
a whole population). It also raises the level of authorisation for
“disclosure of information in the case of a national emergency” from a
single minister to a joint secretary equivalent in the central government
specifically authorised to do so by an order of the Union government.

But the worries over the bill refuse to go away. Another major complication
in the NIAI Bill is to do with biometrics. Enlisting for a UID number is
meant to be voluntary. However, under the Citizenship Act, it is an offence
not to provide biometrics information. “This is the legal loophole that the
UID project is using to convert its so called ‘voluntary’ scheme into a
mandatory surveillance project,” Abraham contends.

Again, while it does not explicitly bar denial of essential services in the
absence of a UID, service and product providers such as insurance agencies,
banks, telecom operators, the tax department and medical agencies could end
up making UID a condition for availing of their services. And the law does
not state explicitly that these agencies cannot do so.

“The winter session of Parliament is over and the UIDAI must urgently work
in the direction of making Aadhaar/UIDAI constitutional,” fumes Praveen
Dalal, who heads an information and communication technology law firm.

Dalal, who has written to various government agencies as well as to UID
project head Nandan Nilekani, believes that Aadhaar or the UIDAI in its
present form is “unconstitutional” primarily because neither the Aadhaar
project nor the UIDAI is governed by any legal framework. “And their legal
framework must be ‘constitutionally valid’, that is, it must pass the tests
of Part III (Fundamental Rights) and other Parts of the Constitution of
India.”

There was no response from Nilekani to an email questionnaire by this paper
at the time of going to print.

In an online signature campaign against the bill addressed to the President
and several public and government agencies, petitioners claim further
anomalies: Personal and household data are being collected through the
Census 2010 with a view to establishing a National Population Register
(NPR). It is proposed to make this information available to the UIDAI. This
is in contravention of Section 15 of the Census Act, which categori-cally
states that information given for the Census is ‘not open to inspection nor
admissible in evidence’.”

Clearly, with the entire UID project fraught with controversial issues
related to citizens’ rights, the NIAI Bill and its provisions too will be
hotly debated before they can come into being as law.
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