Aadhaar cannot be wished away: Govt

Though the courts wanted Aadhaar to be delinked with welfare measures, the State Government appears to be unmindful. In a video conference held with all the district collectors on Thursday, Raymond Peter, Principal Secretary of Social Welfare made it clear that every student who wished to get scholarship shall submit the application on or before January 21 along with Aadhaar number.

“Aadhaar number was made mandatory in view of the new guidelines. We want to ensure all genuine students belonging to socially and financially backward communities get the scholarship. Aadhaar gives a student an identity, an authority. We cannot delink it at this juncture. Even now it is not too late. They can as well apply for UID in the next fifteen days and get it” he explained.

The verification process would be done at the college level itself and all managements should cooperate to identify the genuine students with perfect details, he urged. Raymond Peter asked the Collectors to form a monitoring group to pursue, on day-to-day basis, the progress of Aadhaar linkage and submission of applications. ‘Contact all SC, ST, BC, Minority, OBC corporations and be after them’ he advised.

The Aadhaar linkage to post metric scholarships has become a stumbling block for many a student since the governmental agencies were unable to provide the cards due to one reason or the other viz lack of proper information, income sources etc. As the issuance of scholarships would be based on online authentication, majority of students are worried whether they would get it or not. The worst case is of rural students and as per the latest information from districts, more than 19 lakh students are yet to get them, casting a shadow on their future.

“An online authentication by the student from the college will be sufficient to know if he or she is studying in the college or not. Later, biometric attendance on a random basis or for each payment release can also be directed to the college managements” Raymond Peter, in his orders which made the guidelines more stringent, explained.

Welfare officers should first check the Aadhaar and bank account numbers before sending to colleges. Every college principal or any other officer designated for the purpose should endorse each and every student. The principal and the designated officer shall also have Aadhaar number and he or she should communicate it to the government. He or she should upload his photograph as well. The Principal and the designated representative should authenticate every Aadhaar-holding student through his Aadhar account to login to the ePASS server.

Government’s move is aimed at curbing the large-scale misuse of scholarships. ‘There must be some methodology on how the freebies can be extended. Reimbursement bill exceeds Rs 61000 crore annually. Aadhaar is one such norm, which makes the student, his family, the principal and the management accountable’ an officer of Social Welfare department observed.