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Government has decided to accord statutory status to Aadhaar to ensure that benefits of the government subsidies directly reach the needy.
"Additionally, as I will elaborate later, we will undertake significant reform including enactment of a law to ensure all government benefits are conferred to people who deserve it by giving a statutory backing to the Aadhar platform," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said while announcing Union Budget 2016-17.
Till date over 98 crore (980 million) Aadhaar numbers have been generated. Per day average of 26 lakh biometric and over 1.5 lakh e-KYC transactions are made. Aadhaar numbers have been seeded in 11.19 crore DBTL accounts out of total 16.5 crore (165 million) DBTL beneficiaries.
There is already a National Identification Authority of India Bill, 2010, pending in the Rajya Sabha.
The statutory status will provide a legal foundation to Aadhaar for expanding its use for a range of developmental purposes.
It has been suggested that all benefits, subsidies or services funded from the consolidated fund of India should be through Aadhaar platform.
Photograph: Reuters