What is multi-purpose identity card, an idea mooted by Amit Shah

New Delhi, Sep 23: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday mooted the idea of a multipurpose identity card for citizens with all utilities like Aadhaar, passport, driving licence and bank accounts.

"Why can't we have just one card for all utilities like Aadhaar, passport, bank account, driving licence, voter card. There should be a system that all data should be put together in a single card. This is a potential. That is why digital census is very important," he said after laying the foundation stone of a new building of the Registrar General of India and Census Commissioner here.

Amit Shah's announcement of a multi-purpose ID card and his many statements promising an Assam-like citizens list renews the possibility that the population register could be revived.

What is multi-purpose identity card

The government is contemplating preparation of a National Register of Indian Citizens and issue of Multi-purpose National Identity Cards (MNICs) based on this register.

The main purpose of this project, to be known as, Multi-purpose National Identity Card project is to provide a credible individual identification system and simultaneous use for several multifarious socio-economic benefits and transactions within and outside the Government. This would form the basis of more efficient e-Governance.

The Citizenship Act

The Citizenship Act, 1955 provides the Central Government to compulsorily register every citizen of India and issue Multipurpose National Identity Card (MNIC) to him. It has been decided that National Population Register (NPR) should be completed and taken to its logical conclusion, which is the creation of National Register of Indian Citizen (NRIC) and National Identity Cards would be issued to Citizens by verification of citizenship status of every usual resident in the NPR. The proposals for the same are under consideration of the Government.

How govt generates multi-purpose identity card

To activate this plan, the first step involves the collection of information on specific characteristics of all usual residents by Government servants duly designated for this purpose.

The second step involves the creation of a digitised database of each resident. Next, photographs, 10 finger prints and IRIS of all usual residents who are of age 5 years and above is collected with reference to the digitised database and in the presence of designated Government servants.

After this, the database is sent to the UIDAI for de-duplication and generation of Aadhaar numbers. This ensures that the database does not contain any duplicates.

Following this, the details are printed out in the form of Local Register of Usual Residents and displayed in the local areas for scrutiny by the public and invitation of claims and objections for a period of 21 days.

What is The National Population Register?

The National Population Register (NPR) is a Register of Usual Residents. It would contain citizens as well as non-citizens. The objective of creating a NPR is to net all usual residents of the country at a given point of time. This would serve as the mother database for creating the National Register of Indian Citizens (NRIC) by verifying the citizenship status of each and every resident.