Law For UIDAI In Pipeline

At last the unique identification authority of India (UIDAI) managing the UID project of India decided to do the right thing. It has decided to propose a law that would regulate its functioning and incorporate provisions for the safeguard of privacy rights of the citizens whose database it is going to manage.

The step came after objections were raised by civil liberty activists in India. The first and most vibrant protest came from the Aadhar Watch Initiative of India. Opposing the Aadhar project of India in its present form the aadhar watch initiative specified the ground on which UIDAI in general and UID project/Aadhar project in particular are illegal and unconstitutional.

This is a welcome step and would strengthen Aadhar project of India in the long run. However, the task is not easy as India does not have any dedicated and exclusive data protection and privacy law. UIDAI would be performing a difficult task especially since it has a time of almost 20 days alone. Let us hope that UIDAI would be able to achieve what it has promised because in the absence of the same, no action of UIDAI can be held to be legal and constitutional.

SOURCE: CIO