Aadhaar Card not mandatory for SIM cards, says Government

New Delhi : The Indian Government on Wednesday directed Telecom operators to provide SIM cards with no mandatory Aadhaar Card as the document of proof.

The companies can accept other documents like a driving license and voter ID to issue a new SIM card.

Telecom secretary Aruna Sundararajan told TOI that the telecom companies have been “asked to follow the directive immediately”.

Two weeks ago, UIDAI sought to dispel the apprehension that data generated in the course of identity authentication by the entities needing it could be aggregated and result the mapping and profiling of Aadhaar holders.

Appearing for UIDAI, senior counsel Rakesh Dwivedi told the five-judge Supreme Court constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra. hearing a spate of cases challenging Aadhaar's constitutional validity, that the UIDAI can't do it and no single requesting entity, which are all under the state's control, accessing UIDAI for the authentication will have all the data.

He was responding to a poser by the bench that fingerprints alone may not be a cause of concern but when they get attached to birth, admission to primary school, further education, CBSE exams, admission to hospital and so on, they become the source of aggregation and hence the need for data protection.

He told bench also comprising Justice A.K. Sikri, Justice A.M. Khanwilkar, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice Ashok Bhushan that the authentication of an individual was not taking place on daily basis, as in many cases, it is once a year or far and few.