Nilekani takes over as head of UIAI

Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani today took over as head of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIAI) which has been tasked to create a national database of identity details of citizens.  

Nilekani said the first set of database will be ready in 12 to 18 months time as announced by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in his budget speech.

"We will be issuing the first set of identification numbers in 12 to 18 months," he told reporters here.  

Nilekani said Ram Sevak Sharma, a 1978 batch Jharkhand cadre IAS officer, will take over as Secretary and CEO of the organisation.  

Nilekani, who was appointed as head of UIAI on July 13, said it will take few weeks for them to "get the team together"  

"We will use biometrics....But we still have not decided what that set will be," he said.  

"It will take us few weeks to stabilise and figure out the team size. It will take us few weeks to get our thoughts together," he added.

"We will assemble the best talent from the government and the private sector. We need experts on security management. Some stuff we will have to look globally," Nilekani said.  

He said the project would require advance technology and that is why he will also look for globally renowned technical experts.  

The co-founder of Infosys said that as outlined by the Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, the first set of identification numbers will be released in 12 to 18 months.       

"The finance minister in his budget speech has said that ID numbers would be issued in 12-18 months. We take that as very strong direction and commitment. So we intend to abide by that," he added.

Asked about total budget for the project, he said it would be premature on his part to comment on the total spending of the project.  

"But we are very confident that whatever is spent on this project is more than we will recoup by the efficiency gains in the economy," Nilekani said.  

On how the authority will issue identification numbers in states like Assam, Tripura and West Bengal where large number of Bangladeshi migrants live, he only said "it is a project for residents. The charter of this (project) is to create an online database of residents of the country."        

Asked whether UIAI will have offices across the country, he said, "We have to examine that very carefully."

Nilekani clarified that the UIAI is not going to issue cards and it will only create a database of residents' identity.

"We are not going to be issuing cards. We are going to be issuing numbers. We are going to issue a unique identification number for each person."        

"Our intention is to give everybody a unique number to each person... We will have to do it with some kind of biometric identification", he said.  

Asked whether he was looking at databases of other government departments, Nilekani said several options are on the table.  

"We could look at using the existing databases. You could do it de novo, start from the beginning. These are very valid things. It is premature to pass judgment on the strategy," he added.        

"We will have a very simple database which provides biometric and demographic identity details like name, number, date of birth.....Very basic things," he said.        

He said there will be different applications and various government departments may use the database for different purposes.  

"So the people who are in the public distribution system will use the number to authenticate whether an individual is eligible to get some subsidies like kerosene or food or whatever," he added.