UIDAI set for an image makeover, to spend Rs 30 crore for its media campaign

NEW DELHI: The Unique Identification Authority of India, the agency that issues the biometric Aadhaar identification card to citizens, is looking for an image makeover, and is willing to spend as much as Rs30 crore a year for a media campaign.

Having got a thumbs up from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, UIDAI has put up a proposal to hire an advertising and creative agency to what it calls dispel misconceptions over the project that has a “spotless record” on the security of data collected.

It wants the campaign to project Aadhaar as an example of nation building. "In recent months, some reservations on Aadhaar have cropped up, mostly misconceived," says the proposal.

There were misconceptions on lack of statutory status, compulsory usage of Aadhaar for public services, encroachment of individual privacy, use of untested biometric technology and partnership with private sector, it said. It needs to be stressed that UIDAI is a "bona fide legal entity"administrated "like any office"of the government and is "fully accountable"to Parliament and the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, its brief said.

Rajesh Bansal, assistant director general of UIDAI, said it is hiring a new agency to help with "information, education and communication related to Aadhaar"as the tenure of a few agencies empanelled earlier had ended.

Its previous budget for advertisement wasn’t immediately available. He didn’t comment on why the proposal document is going into minute details of the so-called misconceptions around UIDAI and on its expectations. UIDAI is looking to hire an ad agency by August. The proposal says the new media strategy will cover social media as well.

The target audience will be people at large to encourage them to enrol for Aadhaar, as well as the corporate sector including telecom companies and policy-makers and influencers to make them "appreciate the transformational potential"of Aadhaar, it says.

Nandan Nilekani, the Infosys founder who was given the responsibility to run the project by the previous government, had resigned and unsuccessfully contested the Lok Sabha elections on a Congress ticket.

Since it was conceived by the Congress, there had been speculation that the Modi government would downsize the Aadhaar project, as hinted in BJP’s manifesto, in favour of the National Population Register (NPR) project. The home ministry had raised concerns over security and privacy issues, saying that UIDAI was employing private individuals to collect data unlike the NPR that relies on government officials.

But, according to sources, Modi has given a go-ahead to UIDAI to enrol more people beyond its existing mandate of 65 crore. He wants to accelerate the roll out of transferring subsidy money directly to consumers’ bank accounts, a programme that uses Aadhaar numbers to identity the beneficiaries.

The Union Budget on Thursday allottedRs2,039 crore to UIDAI againstRs1,550 crore last year. Home Minister Rajnath Singh told Parliament this week that UIDAI and NPR would work in "synergy and mutual coordination"to speedily complete the task of enrolment.