About UIDAI

• • The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is a statutory authority established under the provisions of the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 (“Aadhaar Act 2016”) in 2016 by the Government of India, under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). 
  • UIDAI was created to issue Unique Identification numbers (UID), named as “Aadhaar”, to all residents of India. The UID had to be (a) robust enough to eliminate duplicate and fake identities, and (b) verifiable and authenticable in an easy, cost-effective way. 
  • The Authority has issued more than 125 crore Aadhaar numbers to the residents of India.

• As per the Aadhaar Act, every individual who qualifies as a resident Indian under the Aadhar Act is eligible to get an Aadhaar card. Resident is a person, including Non-resident Indian (NRI) or Foreign nationals, who has been living in India for a period of 182 days or more in the preceding 12 months.

• Under the Aadhaar Act 2016, UIDAI is responsible for Aadhaar enrolment and authentication, including operation and management of all stages of Aadhaar life cycle, developing the policy, procedure, and system for issuing Aadhaar numbers to individuals and perform authentication and the security of identity information and authentication records of individuals.

Why in News?

• Senior IAS officer Amit Agrawal has assumed the charge as the Chief Executive Officer, CEO, of Unique Identification Authority of India, UIDAI.

https://newsonair.gov.in/News?title=Amit-Agrawal-assumes-charge-as-CEO-of-UIDAI&id=462888