Nowadays, in Assam, an issue is causing a lot of problems regarding Aadhaar and Government related beneficial schemes. One of the persons named, Babul Kumar Hajong’s claimed that he is not able to avail many services and welfare schemes that are provided by the Central and Government of Assam. It is stated that Babul does not have his Aadhaar card. The reason is that his mandatory biometric ID had also been blocked which is becoming a huge barrier in availing the services and welfare schemes. Babul Kumar stated that he had applied a lot of times for his Aadhaar registration but multiples times it had been abandon. The major issue that he is facing is that his Biometric ID had been currently blocked and he will not get his Aadhar ID back until and unless the matter is resolved.
There are 38 lakhs of People along with Babul Kumar in Assam, who are facing the same Biometric ID blocked issues and they are also not able to avail themselves of the welfare schemes. All these peoples are claiming and making responsible for this issue to the NRC (National Register of Citizen) department and now those people are not able to enroll for a new Aadhaar. A letter had been sent to the Center by the Government of Assam, requesting them to provide help in activating the Biometric ID of those individuals. But no proper action had been taken in this regard from the UIDAI. one of the members of NRC passed remarks by saying that the Supreme Court now has to intervene in this matter because as per the Court’s direction in 2019 the NRC data will be protected as similar to the security provided to the Aadhaar data.
Many people who are having an Aadhaar card are able to avail many beneficial welfare services. But in Assam, the Aadhaar coverage is dull as related to the other cities of India as it was observed by the NRC when the work was going on. During the election, many people like Hojang, make expectations from the politician that they will seriously take the matter. Babul said to the ET that he is not able to avail of the schemes because of his issue. He said that he have requested too many Government officers as well as bank officers but nobody can help him out with this matter. He added that he had also approached many political parties but no one had solved his matter.
It is recorded that almost 3.30 crore people had registered themselves in NRC and around 40 lakh people from them prohibited in the draft that was launched by the NRC department on 30th July 2018. From them, 36.28 lakh residents were claimed for interposing on the list and almost 2 lakh people had applied for their objections.
Last year in November, a meeting had taken place on this matter in which the Secretary of Assam JishnuBarua and Home Secretary Gyanendra Dev Tripathi attended the meeting. Mr. Tripathi said that they had written a letter to the Indian Government regarding the issue. They are in connection with the Government and requested them to take strict action and unfreeze the Biometric ID of the individuals of Assam.