 "As many as 51 crore Aadhaar numbers issued so far: UIDAI")
The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has issued as many as 51 crore Aadhaar numbers so far with about 11 lakh of such numbers generated every day.
"UIDAI has completed issuance of 51 crore Aadhaar numbers. With generation of about 11 lakh Aadhaar numbers every day, the flagship programme appears all set to complete its mandate of covering 60 crore population in the next few months," an official statement said today.
UIDAI had issued the first Aadhaar number in September 2010 and reached the 8 crore mark by November 2011.
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It issued another 15 crore Aadhaar numbers in the next one year until November 2012, and has issued a further 28 crore numbers in the past 12 months.
Eleven states and Union Territories have Aadhaar saturation levels of 75 per cent or above, with several of them -- Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Tripura, Delhi and Chandigarh -- at levels above 90 per cent, the statement added.
As per government data, over four crore Aadhaar numbers holders in the country have linked their bank accounts with Aadhaar to take advantage of the Aadhaar enabled payment services (AEPS).
In a new service introduced recently, six banks, including State Bank of India (SBI), currently provide for Aadhaar-to- Aadhaar mobile-based payments.
Aadhaar numbers leveraged implementation of several central and state government programmes including 28 Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) schemes for central sector in 121 districts, and DBT for Liquefied Petroleum Gas (DBTL) in 95 districts.
"Over Rs 1,500 crore have already been transferred over the Aadhaar Payment Bridge (APB) in more than 2.8 crore transactions under DBT and DBTL. Usage of Aadhaar numbers has helped in preventing duplicates and fakes," it said.
As many as 156 banks, including a number of co-operative and rural banks, are currently participating on APB platform.
Enrolment for Aadhaar is entirely voluntary. Aadhaar number is already used as a proof of identify or proof of address or both by several programmes and schemes run by central and state governments.