India on very good wicket on privacy, says Nandan Nilekani

By Lalit K JhaWashington, Oct 14 (PTI) India is on a "very good wicket"on privacy in this age of digital technology, artitect of theAadhaar schem...
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By Lalit K JhaWashington, Oct 14 (PTI) India is on a "very good wicket"on privacy in this age of digital technology, artitect of theAadhaar scheme Nandan Nilekani has said, expressing confidencethat the government's unique-identity number plan would beable to successfully pass the test of privacy.

Aadhaar card scheme, which has enrolled more than 1billion people, was launched by the previous UPA government,and has been supported by the current government.

Addressing an audience at an event organised by theCenter for Global Development on the sidelines of the annualmeeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank,Nilekani said,"I think India is on a very good wicket onprivacy".

Thanks to Aadhaar many activists went to the SupremeCourt and they claimed that it was a privacy violation, saidthe 62-year-old non-executive chairman of Infosys -- India'ssecond largest software services firm.

That challenge by activists, he said, led to even moreexistential question in India is privacy a fundamental rightat all.

The question went to a nine-judge Supreme Court benchand they gave "what I call one of the best judgements" in theSupreme Court history, he said, responding to a question onprivacy and Aadhaar card.

"And they (judges) said, yes privacy is a fundamentalright. However, the state can circumscribe that privacy forspecific social goals," he said, adding that they identifiednational security, prevention of crime prevention, protectionof revenue and social welfare benefits as the four reasons.

Nilekani said that the judges said that circumscribing ofprivacy has to be based on three things.

It has to be based on a law.It has to be based on thetest of proportionality and reasonableness.

"The court laid down an excellent framework. And at thesame time they said that technology and digital technology arekey enablers for social progress and innovation, the architectof Aadhar card said," he said.

Now that the judges have laid a framework, there would bea second bench of the court, which will test whether Aadhaarmeets that framework.

"We're very confident that it will," Nilekani said.

Responding to a question, Nilekani said that from apolicy perspective "it has to be clear" that nobody should bedenied an entitlement due to lack of access to technology.

A good system would obviously have the ability to save ifthere's no connectivity or environment does not work, oneshould give the overriding capability to the service provider.

So, it is important to make sure that technologydoes not come as a hurdle in providing benefits to people.

A combination of well-designed override with fraudanalytics can solve these issues.

"As people learn the system, they are going to dothat," he said.

According to Nilekani, there are many challenges thatrequire a platform thinking as a public good.

"It's important that we recognise that such a categoryexists. If a particular service or product is offered througha commercial platform that's great. Nobody's saying no to thatbut there is a problem that only can be solved with societalplatform for the public good. That is unavoidable," he said.

Societal platforms, he said, is not about excludingmarket participants.

Societal platforms, he argued, creates the levelplaying field and then market participants can operate onthat.

It's entirely possible that the entire digitalpayments that are provided by a combination of publicfinancial institutions and private banks.

But the societal platform provides the rules of thegame, he said.

That is the role of society and government to provide therules of the game.

"That's what this is all about. So think of this as onemore way of enforcing the rules of the game," Nilekani said.

PTI LKJUZM.

This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.

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