Activists slam govt on Aadhaar claims
Social activists have accused the government of putting exaggerated emphasis on the Aadhaar card benefits, alleging the government is misleading people by not providing the actual figure of the beneficiaries registered under the Aadhaar-based biometric authentication to avail subsidised foodgrains and other benefits. They said the Centre’s claim that technology and Aadhaar helped weed out crores of fake ration cards was without any basis.
In a press conference on Tuesday, activists and academics, including Anjali Bhardwaj, Nikhil Dey, Reetika Khera, Dipa Sinha and Amrita Johri, accused the government of sharing “misleading data” to paint a rosy picture on Aadhaar.
Ms Bhardwaj of National Campaign for the People’s Right to Information said RTI applications seeking details that could have backed Mr Modi’s statements on Aadhaar, made in Lok Sabha on February 7, this year, had elicited no concrete response. Ms Bhardwaj filed an RTI with Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) seeking the state-wise break-up of the bogus ration cards referred to by the PM and the names and addresses of all those whose cards were cancelled. The PMO transferred the RTI application to department of food & public distribution (DFPD), which in turn directed Ms Bhardwaj to refer to its website, which has a document of consolidated state-wise data of the period — 2006 to 2016.
“According to that document, 6.26 crore bogus/ineligible ration cards have been deleted by the states between 2006 and 2016. Now firstly, ineligible does not necessarily mean fake and secondly, the data does not pertain to the period the PM referred to and thirdly, it does not match with the figures shared by him,” Ms Johri of the “Satark Nagrik Sangathan” said.