The following article was written by Sangeeta Delampady, a young political activist based in Bangalore.
It is not a rarity these days to receive frequent text messages asking for the linking of Aadhaar to a bank account or a mobile number. The government has been asking us to link this universal ID to various utilities. It has become voluntarily mandatory for every single citizen to link Aadhaar to several services so as to avail the required facilities without interruption or disconnection. Aadhaar has been hailed as a one-step, or to be precise, one-fingerprint solution for all our needs. This 12-digit number is supposed to make our lives convenient and give an identity to those who do not have any ID-related document. But is that really the case?