• The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is a statutory authority established under the provisions of the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 by the Government of India.
• The Union government withdrew a notification from a Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) office cautioning people against sharing photocopies of their Aadhaar card, just two days after the advisory was issued, claiming that it would be “misinterpreted”.
• The act is also called the Aadhaar Act 2016.
• It comes under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).
• UIDAI was created to issue Unique Identification numbers (UID), named as “Aadhaar”, to all residents of India.
• As per the 2016 Act, UIDAI is accountable for the authentication and enrolment of Aadhaar, and also to safeguard the data protection of identity information of individuals.
• Aadhaar number is a 12-digit random number issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to the residents of India after satisfying the verification process laid down by the Authority.
• Any individual, irrespective of age and gender, who is a resident of India, may voluntarily enrol to obtain an Aadhaar number.
• Person willing to enrol has to provide minimal demographic and biometric information during the enrolment process which is totally free of cost.
• An individual needs to enrol for Aadhaar only once and after de-duplication only one Aadhaar shall be generated, as the uniqueness is achieved through the process of demographic and biometric de-duplication.
• The Parliament has passed the Aadhaar and Other Laws (Amendment) Act, 2019 which allows voluntary use of Aadhaar as proof of identity.

Model Question

Q. With reference to the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), consider the following statements :

1. The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is a statutory body under the Aadhaar Act 2016.
2. UIDAI comes under the Ministry of Home Affairs.

Which of the statements given above is /are correct?

(a) 1 only

(b) 2 only

(c) Both 1 and 2

(d) Neither 1 nor 2

Answer : A

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