Kalam to get first social security card

The first permanent social security card will roll out on February 25 as part of the Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion) project.

The Union labour ministry proposes to provide smart cards with permanent social security number to the over 32 million members of the employees' provident fund.

A database will contain names of workers in India and make the EPF a sophisticated computerised system to track default.

The expenditure on the project, to be incurred by the EPF Organisation, may raise hackles in the finance ministry, which scuttled a home ministry-sponsored project for making national identity cards for citizens, citing a resource crunch.

However, it seems the finance ministry does not exercise any influence on the EPF Organisation, which has its own managers in the form of the Central Board of Trustees, a situation which has enabled Union labour minister Sahib Singh Verma to go full steam ahead on his dream project.

In a high profile programme to mark the golden jubilee of the EPF Organisation, Verma will give a smart card with a permanent social security number to the country's first citizen, President A P J Abdul Kalam, on February 25.

Verma, who mooted the idea of giving a permanent social security number to all members of the EPF Organisation, is pinning his hopes on this programme to occupy political centrestage and project an image of a pro-active minister.

"This project could be dovetailed with the home ministry's project of making a national register for citizens," said a government official.

With the President accepting Verma's invitation to inaugurate the function, officials of the EPF trust are trying to make the event a grand success. The labour ministry has raked in Siemens Information System to prepare the card for Kalam.

However, the project will take a year to complete. The ministry has planned a publicity blitz for the week, ending February 25.

Ministry officials say the smart card will enable members to access details of their contribution to the EPF on the Internet.

"We have given directions to the EPF office to modernise and re-invent," an officials said. The EPF staff are also being trained in computer and information technology.