Principal Secretary, Food and Transport, Faiz Ahmed Kidwai, has said that the Aadhar card has helped to establish the identity of every citizen of the country.

Kidwai was addressing the State Level Workshop on ‘Recent Initiatives to Simplify Use of Aadhaar’ by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) at the Academy of Administration.

He said that Aadhaar also gave identity to individuals who did not have anything to identify themselves.

He said that sharing of best practices and recent initiatives taken by UIDAI is one of the important features of this workshop.

He said that ‘Aadhaar’ has become incredibly strong.

He said that more than 313 DBT welfare schemes are using the Aadhaar platform for targeted distribution of benefits and subsidies to beneficiaries and the estimated savings is Rs.2.22 lakh crore.

The two sessions of the workshop deliberated on the latest authentication features added to the Aadhaar ecosystem, cases of innovative use of Aadhaar and best practices implemented in Madhya Pradesh, data privacy and information security, Direct Benefit Transfer and Aadhaar Enabled Payment System.

Along with this, the details of m-Aadhaar App, Aadhar Online Services, Aadhar Enrollment and Updation Services to make a smooth experience for the residents were also explained in detail.

TS, Deputy Director General, UIDAI Shri Sanjay Kumar Sohni, pointed out that Aadhaar has become the core of India’s digital public infrastructure.

It has bridged the digital divide, enabled e-KYC services, provided doorstep banking service through mobile and provided the facility of direct cash transfer to the bank accounts of needy and eligible beneficiaries of various welfare schemes of the government.

He also mentioned initiatives like face authentication, offline verification and reduction in authentication fees charged by UIDAI. Shri Niket Diwan, Project Manager, UIDAI, State Office, Bhopal shared the legal aspects.

Senior officials of the state government, banks, BSNL, Department of Posts, National Informatics Center (NIC) and central government participated in the workshop.

Sanjay Kumar Sohni, ITS, DDG, UIDAI, RO-Delhi, Prem Narayan, DDG, UI.DAI, HQ.-Delhi, Shri Abhijit Agrawal, Managing Director, MPSEDC Ltd., Shri Sumit Patel, Director UIDAI- State Office Bhopal, Lt. Col. Sanjay Singh Rautela, Director U.K. IDAI, RO-Delhi took part in the workhop.