New Delhi: A Parliamentary Committee on Home Affairs has suggested to the Union Home Ministry (MHA) to use Aadhar metadata of individuals for creating a family database for upcoming census and updation of National Population Register (NPR).
The committee headed by Congress MP Anand Sharma opined that the process will avoid duplicity of biometric identification and wastage of expenditure. It further said that all the states and UTs should be fully convinced on various issues pertaining to the upcoming updation of NPR to have a national consensus for clarity.
It may be mentioned here that several state governments including West Bengal, Punjab and others have raised their objections to the NPR exercise saying that the exercises will target a particular section of people.
The committee observed that a huge amount has already been spent on data collection under Aadhar. But in Budgetary estimate 2020-21, Rs 4,568 crore has been allocated for RGI (census 2020-21).
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The committee has expressed its concern to the Home Ministry after the later replied that the Aadhar is an individual data and in order to create a family database, NPR exercise has been undertaken.
The committee is of the opinion that the Aadhar is not just an individual's data but is also tied up with ration card, PAN card, etc.
"The committee fails to understand as to why this should be treated as individual data only. In view of the same, the committee would like the MHA to explore the feasibility of using the Aadhar metadata for the census and the updation of NPR 2020-21," it said.
Earlier, the Home Ministry had said that in Aadhar database consolidated details of a family is not available nor from this database can a family structure be created without visiting each household and collecting information such as relationship among family members.
"NPR database is created by collecting family-wise data and it can be strengthened by linking Aadhar to each member," the ministry said.
The ministry said that during the updation of NPR 2020, the Aadhar number is being collected on a voluntary basis.
"Presence of Aadhar number in NPR database will facilitate its integration with other database and will also help in cleaning of the various database. NPR database may be shared with central and state governments to prepare public welfare-oriented schemes," the ministry said.
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This office is in constant touch with state and UT administrations on various issues related to conducting of census 2021 and updation of NPR, the Home Ministry said.
"However, in view of the outbreak of Covid19 pandemic, the Phase I of census 2021 and updation of NPR have been postponed until further orders," the Home Ministry said.
