Unable to link Aadhaar with bank accounts? Banks asked to enroll, update facility

The move comes in a bid to help citizens facing a gigantic task of linking all bank accounts to Aadhaar after due verification, as made mandatory by a June 1 notification of the finance ministry.

New Delhi, July 12: Individuals struggling to link their bank accounts with Aadhaar can now approach banks for Aadhaar enrolment and update facility.

In order to ease the difficulty in linking the two, Unique Identification Authority of India has made it a point to all the banks, including private sector to provide Aadhaar enrolment and update facility to their customers.

The move comes in a bid to help citizens facing a gigantic task of linking all bank accounts to Aadhaar after due verification, as made mandatory by a June 1 notification of the finance ministry.

Customers who shall fail to link their bank accounts with aadhaar by December 31 may not be able to access their accounts as it may be rendered inoperative. The access would be reinstated only upon furnishing aadhaar.

Also, in view of the increasing importance of the unique ID, recently the government made aadhaar mandatory for opening a new bank account.

So, the amended Aadhaar Regulations, 2016 now allows and engages all schedule banks as registrars of UIDAI who can enroll people for getting aadhaar. Until now, only public-run banks could act as UIDAI registrars and that too on the discretion of banks.

While most banks are offering the facility online, it is anticipated that many people may not have an Aadhaar yet or their address details may not be up to date or their photograph on Aadhaar card may be different from the one in the bank records - leading to a possible rejection of their linkage request by the bank, reports Economic Times.

Speaking on the issue CEO UIDAI Ajay Bhushan Pandey said that the customer need not go on a search for an Aadhaar enrolment centre. We have amended existing regulations to make a provision that all scheduled banks will have to offer Aadhaar enrolment facilities within the bank premises to their customers if they do not have Aadhaar.

The challenges in the process, apart from many not having an Aadhaar card, include a mismatch in address details and outdated photographs. In that case, the bank will update his or her Aadhaar on furnishing of documents inside the bank premises.

OneIndia News