Electoral reforms - Online voting and funding reforms needed; Not One Nation One Election

Updated: 18-Dec-24

ग़रीब लहरों पे पहरे बिठाए जाते हैं,
और समन्दरों की तलाशी कोई नहीं लेता.....
~ वसीम बरेलवी

Given one hour to save the world, I would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and 5 minutes finding the solution. ~ Albert Einstein

The real problem of our democracy is
i) how to get more numbers of honest and smart people in positions of power and
ii) how to make the Government more responsive.

Electoral reforms are a large part of the solution. Common lament we hear is that politics is a dirty business and only crooks enter and thrive in it - qualifications or track record of public service or philanthropy matter little. This is ofcourse mostly untrue, however, there is no gainsaying that money swings the election results. If we dig deeper we can easily find the larger part of the problem - it is the system and the play it gives to dirty money that is the culprit and not the politician or the wannabe politican!

WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY: 

One Nation One Election Bill has been introduced on 17th Dec'24 in Lok Sabha CLIP For it to be passed, 2/3rd majority vote will be required, after Joint Parliamentary Committee has vetted the 322-page report. Before this can happen, the citizens of India have a rare opportunity to discuss election reforms holistically. The reform of "1N1E" a.k.a. #One-Nation-One-Poll, can be substituted by another set of reforms with all the claimed benefits and more. Protagonists of 1N1E or 1N1P need to be educated, but more importantly, we - the citizens - must push for making Indian democracy safe and more vibrant.  

In the interdependent triad of contributors to the progress of the nation: PEOPLE - POLICIES - SYSTEMS - we should start with the "SYSTEMS" reform because it is doable with the flick of a pen and it will have a significant and immediate impact. Moving one log can clear a log jam!

The current election system is such that more honest and smart candidates likely lose elections and those who bend the rules (or their party does) likely win elections. Fortunately, today India has the digital public infrastructure and a flexible Constitution, capable of amendments, therefore, we can attempt to undertake what is proposed here - a set of urgent "rules reforms" which we can do before 2026, and "online voting systems reforms" which can be done during the 2024-2029 time-frame. These reforms can be done through the existing "democratic system". Most politicians will resist this change for reasons that are too obvious to review. Without public pressure, the existing legislators likely have no interest  to understand and demand the required changes. 

The idea of syncing all elections conflicts with the spirit of the existing federal structure envisaged in the Constitution of India. If the benefit we are looking for is to cut time and cost of conducting elections, debate should centre on leveraging the Digital Public Infrastructure  (DPI) we already have.

We know there are monetary and non-monetary costs of conducting elections (1- footnote).

For e.g. the 2024 General Elections were estimated to have cost $14 billion and the 2019 GE were estimated to have cost USD 7.5 to 10 Billion, i.e. Rs.60K to 80K Crores - of which at least Rs.50K crores was spent by candidates and their parties and Rs. 9K crores was Government's share of expenditure. After syncing all elections, i.e. General Elections, State Elections and Local Government or Panchayat Elections, it is hard to guess what the total expense will balloon to. 

 

The official declared income of BJP and INC is less than 10% of the abovementioned election expense figure (Visit Myneta ADR website for all details)! In other words, the elections are conducted with massive amount of money mobilised and spent under the table - one can imagine the quid pro quo in such transactions and the inevitable corruption that ensues. If we stack up the costs of State level and Panchayat level elections, the total will be staggering - likely to be few lacs of crore rupees and the quid pro quos several lacs of crore rupees. The cost of the government employees and security forces deployed to oversee these elections is invisible. The deployment of millions of staff, results in lost productivity and loss of school time as teachers and school resources are extensively requisitioned in organising elections. Due to logistical reasons, elections in many states stretch over several weeks!

The non-monetary costs include the adverse effects of governments going into seizure due to MCC - Model Code of Conduct which gets kicked in ahead of election dates. The government is not allowed to announce policies and it cannot roll out plans that may seem to influence the voters.

The dominant BJP and INC national parties have their leaders over stretched due to perpetual election cycles; the regional parties are not unhappy with the current situation; they likely view with suspicion the debate over syncing elections. Check Election Commission of India: ECI recognises 6 or 7 political parties as national parties. BJP is reputed to win elections because of Modi ji's personal popularity which made the 2019 Parliament (Lok Sabha) elections look like a Presidential election. PM Modi has also come to believe that he alone is sufficient to win all elections. His recent boast in the Parliament (Rajya Sabha) on 9-Feb-23:"एक अकेला कितनों पे भारी पड़ता है "! PM Modi wants to sync elections ostensibly to save costs but in his heart, he may be wanting the elections to become Presidential type.

To tamp down the abovementioned monetary and non-monetary costs, Modi ji has proposed a debate on "One Nation One Election". The democratic system envisaged in the Constitution of India requires a five-year term provided the government has a majority of members in the house, if it loses the majority and an alternative government cannot be formed, elections have got to be triggered within a stipulated period of x months. Therefore, this rule will conflict with the proposition of One Nation One Election as soon as any Government collapses before x months remain in its 5-year tenure. A constitutional amendment will be required to compress or stretch the period of tenure that remains in every case of premature cessation of a Government to sync all elections.

Rather than amend the constitution to accommodate the 1N1P idea, is it not better to discuss how to make elections less costly and quicker? No one seems to be debating this question!

Practically, all resident Indians and overseas Indian citizens, who are eligible voters, today have Aadhaar IDs. Over 1.3 billion (over 99.8% of all adults) Aadhaar Ids generated. 

 

WHAT WE NEED TO DO

 

Aadhaar should be passed as a security bill - at present it is emasculated by the order of the SCI because Aadhaar was passed as a Money Bill - Modi Government was scared so it bypassed obtaining voting in Rajya Sabha by legislating Aadhaar as a Money Bill. SCI has therefore, curtailed mandatory applications of Aadhaar to financial benefit (transactions) schemes or tax compliance issues like PAN linkage with Aadhaar. (Myths about mandatory use of Aadhaar and risks of sharing Aadhaar number). Those who apprehend risks due to Aadhaar linkage with voter ID should read: Common misconceptions about Aadhaar.

 

First, the past lapse of passing Aadhaar as a money bill has to be rectified so that necessary legislative support is provided for allowing Aadhaar to be used in non-monetary applications like the security and ID authentication, required in our voting system. The latter proposition is certainly likely to find acceptance with all parties - provided BJP and GOI make their intentions explicit. 

With today's DPI in India, it is very easy to conduct electronic online voting. First step, as mentioned above, is to get the legislative support to mandate linking the Voter Card (proof of citizenship) with Aadhaar Id (proof of Id) - this will ensure there are no duplicates in the voter database AND all voters are authenticated every time they vote. This process will also include the process of syncing names on the two cards - it is estimated that more than 80% of the people have mismatching names between their Aadhaar and Voter ID cards. 

 

Without a data protection act, it would have been justifiably considered objectionable to link Aadhaar with Voter ID. Recently THE DIGITAL PERSONAL DATA PROTECTION ACT, 2023 has been notified in the Gazette of India (11-Aug-23). Voting as we all know follows the "secret ballot" code. Computer program can be written such that no one can find out the identity of a voter without authorisation and now the notified Data Protection Act will (hopefully) curb mala fide authorisation to any agent of the government. In the voting application program, it is necessary to ensure that at the time of voting, the voter's biometrics be authenticated to prevent proxy voting i.e. it is necessary to ensure that a person in wrongful possession of a Voter card (Voter ID credentials) is not voting. In this application VIRTUAL ID (VID) for authentication cannot serve the purpose. VID is issued by UIDAI and it is meant to prevent profiling - i.e. pulling data from different applications databases in which Aadhaar is seeded. Since we want to deduplicate individuals having multiple Voter cards and authenticate a voter every time, it is necessary to link Aadhaar. Read about VID here.


HOW WILL THE PROPOSED ONLINE VOTING SYSTEM WORK

 

Online (INTERENT) voting can enable citizens to vote from anywhere in the country. One of the reasons for "low voter turnout" is migrant population - huge number of people are not available in their constituency on the day of voting. At the time of doing online voting, as already mentioned, the voter would be asked to submit biometric authentication - this ensures the eligible person is voting - multiple time voting can be allowed in the time window announced for voting - only the last vote will count. Those who do not have biometrics submission device will need to visit any ECI authorised mobile services centre or any bank branch to vote - for a small fee of Rs. 2 - 10 (which would be reimbursed to the agency by ECI online - citizen will not pay for the first time). There will be no need to set up booths and requisition millions of teachers for election duty at the time of voting. (See linked notes below - current cost to ECI is above Rs.100 per vote cast).

The above arrangement will drop the election costs drastically (by over 90%) - logistics will be highly simplified. Migrant workers, estimated to be between 10% to 20% of total voters, who are not present in their constituency on the days of voting, will be able to exercise their franchise. In 2019 LS Elections, ONLY 67% of the eligible voters actually voted - in Bombay the voting turnout was only 55% - with online anytime-anywhere voting facilities, the polling percentage would have been higher. Areas without Internet access, are already being served by satellite linked (through VSATs) CSCs (Common Services Centres); despite this, if there are pockets not served by CSCs then ECI will have to improvise suitable "CSCs".

 

BENEFITS OF ONLINE VOTING

 

With successful introduction of online voting, India will not only save enormous cost and time, it could derive many other benefits. Voting participation will improve SIGNIFICANTLY as all of the migrant workers will be able to vote from wherever they happen to be on the dates of polling; the sheer convenience will pull many more voters. 

 

OTHER MAJOR REFORMS THAT WILL BECOME FEASIBLE DUE TO ONLINE VOTING:

 

O1.     Two-round system (TRS) of voting in place of the FPTP (First-Past-The-Post) currently followed: If TRS is adopted, in the first round if the top candidate fails to secure 50%+ votes, a run-off election round will get triggered. In a modified TRS, in the run-off round, only the top two candidates (instead of all candidates having polled above x% votes) will be allowed to participate. With online voting, the cost of conducting the TRS elections will NOT be a barrier and democratic representation will become stronger as we will ensure that the winner has 50%+ votes. TRS will overcome a lot of maladies. A major defect in the FPTP system due to which opposition parties with similar ideologies, but one which is opposite of the winning party's ideology, lose out as their votes get split and the "majority" party wins despite obtaining fewer votes (i.e. less than the combined votes of the opposition parties). In FPTP system, the winning party can win disproportionate number of seats compared to its share of votes. For e.g. in 2019 LS Elections, BJP won 303 or 55.8% seats (=303/543) even though the party obtained only 37.36% of the polled votes. [The NDA alliance, which included BJP, won 353 seats with 45% of votes]. Net effect of FPTP system is that a Government can be formed by a party formation with an ideology that is rejected by the majority -this is the case at present. With TRS, this situation would not arise even if parties with opposing but similar ideologies (with respect to the dominant party's ideology) are not united in a prepoll alliance - because in the second round, the split votes will tend to coalesce in support of the only candidate remaining in the contest! [Unlike in USA and UK, where there are two dominant parties, in India for most seats, the contest is among multiple parties, therefore, the votes get split much more and the winning candidate often has a vote share well below 50%. FPTP thus has serious pernicious effects of "unrepresentative democracy" in countries where the elections are fought with many parties in the fray. Ref: Note on TRS vs FPTP for India.

O2.     Referendums can be introduced. Based on legislatures listing worthy issues for referendums, either quarterly or half-yearly or yearly referendums could be held at all levels of Government- National, State or Local Urban or Rural Governments. Referendums will make the Governments more responsive as people will get a greater voice. Legislators will tend to be more accountable.

Gradually the country can refine the election processes and graduate to having issue-based referendums, annually or half-yearly, like Switzerland and other Western democracies have. 

 

THE URGENT REFORM OF ELECTION (POLITICAL) FUNDING, EXPENSE AND TRANSPARENCY 

The five specific issues we should debate are categorised under two groups; there are three issues related to money and two related to transparency and accountability.

1. FUNDING AND EXPENSES RELATED

F1.1 Candidate expenses: The per candidate election expense cap must go - especially as there is no cap on the Political Party expenses. For MLAs and MPs - at present the limit is Rs. 28 lacs to 95 lacs only. This preposterous rule places independent candidates (poor or billionaires - doesn't matter) or candidates of newbie and not-so-rich parties, at a tremendous disadvantage. The expense cap is only for candidates - there is no limit on expenses a party may incur in the candidate's constituency - in many constituencies, experts have calculated the expenses range between Rs.10 to Rs.70 crores (in MLA or MP contests). At present, parties disclose election expenses to match their income which is estimated to be less than 10% of their real expenses. This means 90% of expenses are off the books. So, the rules need to be modified in a way that candidates and parties can mobilise funds and spend legally. Present system forces both spending and mobilising to be done illegally - and it compels virtually every candidate to lie on oath about the real expenses incurred. And in this process honest and successful individuals who have no black money to fight elections, either don't enter politics or if they do, they likely lose elections to those who outspend them (illegally) - one example easy to cite is that of Nandan Nilekani (a technocrat billionaire) who contested for a MP's seat, on a Congress ticket and lost to a BJP opponent, in Bangalore - a city considered to be the IT Capital of India! No reform of any kind seems more important than the amendment of existing political (election) funding and expense limit rules that clearly diminish the chances of good, honest and successful people from getting into elected positions. When honest and smart people get into positions of power, one can expect to see reforms and policies that actually favour building a vibrant democracy - one that provides more voice to its citizens and also drives the future progress of India.

 

F1.2 Political funding: NO DONATION to a political party or a candidate should be hidden - there ought to be 100% transparency; anonymous political bonds must be abolished; the bonds tend to go to the ruling party (and it is not hidden from the ruling party, rather it is hidden from the opposition parties and the public). There should be a high cap (order of 50 or 100 crore rupees) on individual or corporate donations, including "permitted" foreign entity's donations. However, above a certain amount of donation, say Rs.5 lacs, there should be an obligation for a complete and detailed disclosure of donor's involvement in ANY government project which is ongoing or which is likely to start; also, of any action that Government has taken against the donor or the donor's brush with law. All donations must be listed on a website mandated by the ECI.

F1.3 State funding and resources support: Each party and candidate must publish their statement of objectives - and be asked to debate; these moderated debates should be on State-paid TV time and on all State-owned platforms which may syndicate the debate feeds to private channels - it is a big flaw in our system that today, candidates are not asked questions - related to new promises, public issues or old promises they may have made! The expensive rallies and physical meetings which involve extravagant preparations and costs will automatically decline if State-sponsored air time is made available - and, more importantly, candidates without monetary resources will be able to communicate with the electorate and give responses to researched questions of expert moderators. The televised debates could be recorded and catalogued on the ECI portal so that voters can access the same anytime (with translated scripts in different languages). Candidate accountability and a more informed electorate are very important in any democracy!

 

2. TRANSPARENCY RELATED

 

T2.1 Candidate disclosures: Candidate's disclosures of his/her qualifications, assets, liability, income criminal cases faced or ongoing and business transactions with Government departments or public enterprises in the form of an affidavit should be published on the ECI website (this is not being done for items mentioned in italics) AND number of complaints or challenges received by the ECI against claims in the candidate's affidavit, and those ECI has verified, along with the details should also be published.(this is not being done today - in fact complaints to ECI are ignored - it verifies nothing). ECI says it has no resources to investigate nor refer such cases to State agencies - this deficiency in the transparency system needs to be fixed by requiring and enabling ECI to settle complaints & challenges and regularly publish the status of its findings. 

T2.2 Party functioning transparency: Political Parties, particularly the "National Political Parties" so recognised by ECI, should be subjected to three rules -
i) they must be brought under the purview of RTI Act,
ii) they must publish their manifesto before each election AND
iii) they must publish their inner party constitutional framework and the audit report of its framework by ECI - it doesn't matter if the framework is "democratic" or "autocratic" or "dynastic"; ECI's audit stamp will merely confirm that the party is following the published framework. This is like the public disclosure a company makes before a public issue - ECI's stamp of audit merely confirms that the party practices are found to be in conformity with its stated constitutional framework - it is not an endorsement of any claims of the party being meritorious - which is a matter of voter's (informed) judgment.. 

 

CONCLUSION

 

To sum up, two sets of reforms are discussed above.
The set of urgent reforms related to money and transparency are capable of being implemented before the next General Election in 2024 - this could happen provided there is sufficient public pressure and / or a political will. These easy-to-do electoral reforms will help in putting honest and smart people in positions of power (as legislators).
The other high-tech reforms for making voting online anytime-anywhere and conducting referendums could be attempted by the legislators elected in the next General Elections (hopefully smarter and more honest), in five years: in 2024-2029. The high-tech reforms will make our democracy far more responsive than it is today; besides, the reforms will also save huge amounts of money (official and unofficial, private or public) and time we spend on electing MPs, MLAs, Corporators and Panchs! We can forget 1N1P and talk about the above reforms instead.

 

Epilogue:

 1. Public pressure is also required to have the Election Commission of India (ECI) conduct free and fair elections; ECI must respond to queries and complaints, manage and act against MCC violations. Serious violations and anomalies have been reported by Citizens Commission on Elections (CCE).  If we cannot make the archaic EVMs, and fraud-prone post-poll processes, safe with the required tweaks, we ought to revert to paper ballots to save our democracy (the tweaks are simple, read my Nov'24 blog)

2. After having been in information systems-designing-developing-deploying business for many decades, and having seen India's Digital Public Infrastructure, I have no doubt that we in India have the capacity and readiness to implement the online voting system described above. See below the transaction volumes we have crossed with two systems (UPI and Aadhaar, no other big country has equivalent systems); no country is close to achieving these volumes, forget beating these performances, USA, China and EU included:

 

We also have millions of Web cameras deployed with online monitoring in hundreds of applications. Each ECI authorised agent, e.g. bank branch, post-office, CSCs (5.21 lac of which 4.13 lac in rural India), TSP offices etc. during the voting time window could have surveillance webcams linked to ECI monitoring stations in which representatives of political parties could remain present so that voters who visit agents to vote could be watched - each transaction of vote would be time stamped (to correlate with recorded video, in case audit is required). This is one example of the future "voting booth" configuration; ultimately, after everyone becomes tech-savvy, even these "booths" could be eliminated.

No voter list, no booths, anytime anywhere voting at one tenth the cost AND more INCLUSIVE

The prefixes O (Online), F (Financial) and T (Transparency) in the numbered items above, are for referencing in Google Form.

Express your opinion (10 minutes to fill-up a form)

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1- Footnote
The Indian Government structure envisages Central Government, State Government and Local Government. In the top two levels of the government there are nominated representatives otherwise representatives are directly elected by the citizens of India. The elections are not in sync so, the country seems to be perpetually in election mode.

At the top level, in the Indian parliament 543 seats of MPs are contested by close to 10K candidates! (Before 2020, two additional MPs were appointed by the President on the advice of the Government).

At the middle tier, in the Legislative Assemblies of the States, for about 4K MLA seats. tens of thousands candidates contest.

At the Panchayat or Municipal level local governments, for about 300K seats there may be over million contestants.

There were 968.8 million registered voters in the 2024 Parliamentary Elections of India.

Ref: http://www.elections.in/government/

Election expenses by candidates and parties Rs.50K to 80K crores: 

Government's expenses in conducting 2019 LS - also called General Elections - Rs.9,000 crores. Assuming there were 900 million eligible voters, the ECI expesne per voter = Rs.100

2- Footnote
Voting will be done with two factor authentication just like it is done with banking or credit card transactions; either with OTP or biometric authentication - voter's finger print or iris scan or facial recognition in future (VID cannot be used instead of Aadhaar).

RELEVANT REFERENCES:

State of ICT and internet voting worldwide: There are only two countries - Estonia and UAE which have implemented online voting for internal as well as external resident citizens - several other countries have more restricted usage of Internet voting.

FPTP versus Two Round or Run-off Elections System

Problems and issues with the existing system:

Electoral Democracy - Book Launch (24-Jun-22)

REPORT OF THECITIZENS’ COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS VOLUME I (Jan'21)

Few relevant articles and notes

EVM - VVPAT anomalies and complaints

Vishwakarma University Law Journal - Paper on election reforms issues and challenges

About 1N1P:

Simultaneous Elections strike at the roots of Parliamentary Democracy 

Umpire cannot be subservient to the team Captain

Jagdeep Chokkar disses the ONOE idea - he says it will remain just a talking point and its purpose BJP sees, is lilely to distract people talking about substantive issues country faces under Modi regime. Video

About role (abuse) of money power:

Role of money in elections - Biggest mobiliser of election money in the world

Indian democracy for whom? Cringeworthy governance!

Knowledge:

Different Election Systems
     

Indian Parliamentary Elections 2019 - results data analysis

The land slide victory of BJP (303 seats) and shock losses suffered by INC (Indian National Congress) and many regional parties have been analysed by many in the press and TV debates. INC didn't win even 10% of the seats - with a tally of 52 seats it's leader doesn't qualify as the LOP (Leader of the Opposition Party) in the Parliament.

A cold analysis of data reveals a stark correlation expected due to religious polarisation. No amount of posturing by INC; temple hopping by Rahul Gandhi could enable it to outperform BJP as a pro-Hindu party. There is no great theory needed to explain the outcomes in different States; population data by religion is not available by parliamentary constituencies otherwise the hypothesis would be easier to validate.

There could be other reasons but probably they played a much smaller role - Balakot strike (pseudo nationalism) certainly seems to have helped according to most reporters. There are various pro-poor schemes which BJP claims have helped it to increase its vote share - Ujjwala Yojna (70 million LPG cooking gas cylinders allotment to poor families with initial fixed subsidy), Swachh Bharat Mission (96 Million toilets built and 565K out of 640K villages declared ODF - Open Defecation Free), Mudra Loan scheme (40 millions sanctioned loans aggregating to 2.5 Lac Crores - 2.5 trillion rupees), PM Sahaj Bijli Ghar Yojna (24.4 million households energised out of targeted 24.8 million HHs).

The detailed worksheet of state wise results (542 seats as one seat's election was cancelled by the Election Commission due to discovery of cash), seats contested, strike rate and correlation with Hindu and non-Hindu populations can be found here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1IHQz3zlEF3vyuf_I8D_7FKU2R5xp1y0R

The argument that it was a vote for pro-incumbency which means for good governance is really vain. How come good governance was not experienced by the electorate in non-Hindu dominated regions?

It is clear that BJP increased its vote share from 31% in 2014 elections to 37.4% in 2019 elections mostly among Hindu voters. It is claimed that BJP increased its votes from among non-Hindu voters too. Actually it remained unchanged - only about 8% on non-Hindus are claimed to have voted for BJP - this is reported in press articles (one is hyperlinked below) - we don't have the data to prove this percentage in the worksheet.

References:

EC website shows seats won constituency wise:

http://results.eci.gov.in/pc/en/partywise/index.htm

The party wise State wise seats contested and seats won data can be found here besides much other data of election expenses, issues and manifestos:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Indian_general_election 

Hindu share of population state wise from 2011 census:

https://www.census2011.co.in/data/religion/1-hinduism.html

https://www.indiatoday.in/elections/lok-sabha-2019/story/election-results-2019-are-hindus-shunning-congress-1535585-2019-05-27

https://www.thehindu.com/elections/lok-sabha-2019/the-verdict-is-a-manifestation-of-the-deepening-religious-divide-in-india/article27297239.ece

Wire story - why Sikhs turned against BJP and favoured Congress

https://thewire.in/politics/punjab-sikh-majority-shunned-modi-hindutva-congress

Another article by Venu Gopal highlights, the Election was not about economy (good governance):

https://thewire.in/macro/narendra-modi-india-economy-slowdown

https://scroll.in/article/925074/verdict-2019-in-charts-and-maps-bjp-started-poorly-congress-nearly-drew-a-blank-from-phases-4-to-6

LiveMint's analysis through ten charts:

https://www.livemint.com/elections/lok-sabha-elections/ten-charts-that-explain-the-2019-lok-sabha-verdict-1558636775444.html

Another LiveMint Article based on a CSDS survey - BJP's support base among Muslims remained unchanged @8%

https://www.livemint.com/politics/news/where-did-the-bjp-get-its-votes-from-in-2019-1559547933995.html

Here are some interesting facts about the Indian electorate and 2019 elections:

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/16/asia/india-election-numbers-intl/index.html

Looking ahead: Congress will need to figure out how to win back the support of Hindus and show why India's progress cannot be helped by Hindu Supremacists! Hopefully, while BJP rules, it will also change and become more inclusive - at least to the extent it overtly claims: SAB KA SAATH SAB KA VIKAS AND VISHWAS! If one or both of these changes don't happen, India could be headed towards becoming Ram Rajya - a "Hindu Rashtra". A mirror image of Pakistan. That will be an India that lacks scientific temper - a medieval India. India that will build biggest temples and statues instead of spending resources on the education and health of it's citizens.

Aadhaar 2.0 - Government must introduce

Supreme Court had to inevitably step into the executive function of correctly implementing Aadhaar which presently is world’s top online identity system. After enrollment of 1.1 billion Indian residents and billions of transactions it has suffered zero data breaches. It offers the fastest, cheapest and most reliable way to establish the identity of a person using his/her bio-metric data. With existing infrastructure of UIDAI which manages Aadhaar, its system can sustain 1 million authentications per hour.

SC’s verdict of 26^th Sep’18 served to validate Aadhaar as a technical solution but it curtailed its applications pending legislative support and prerequisite data protection safeguards and most importantly, it held that the Government cannot deny a citizen any benefits for want of Aadhaar authentication. Systems designers, of applications that couple with Aadhaar, need to recognise that with two finger prints and iris, authentication is 99.5% inclusive, and with proposed facial recognition method, the inclusion may exceed 99.99% but it can’t touch 100%. Authentication can also fail due to Internet connectivity which is far lower than 99.5% in the best served areas in India. The solution to exclusion is mostly outside UIDAI.

Aadhaar as implemented by NDA Government deservedly got kicked right and left by many challengers but luckily the Unique ID System survived the constitutional validity test in the split verdict of the SC. Dissenting Justice, D.Y. Chandrachud upheld Jairam Ramesh’s contention that Aadhaar Act should be struck down as its scope is much wider than what a Money Bill permits. Indeed, due to Aadhaar being placed under a money bill, it was grossly underutilised, and now the majority verdict imposes further restrictions on its applications. Curiously, in the 1448 pages verdict, there is not a single reference to “Virtual ID” which is a facility deployed already by UIDAI (https://goo.gl/Edgi9e). VID, a 16-digit number that a user can generate in few seconds, permits authentication without divulging one’s 12-digit Aadhaar number. VID is advantage to the individual but disadvantage to the Government that wants to profile the individual and build a surveillance state! Individual can merrily share VID with any number of service providers, Government or private, without fear of getting profiled as VID is temporary – every time a user generates it, s/he gets a different VID.

Government can salvage its reputation and do the country immense good by coming up with Aadhaar 2.0. Here is what needs to happen for Aadhaar 2.0 to work; just a few tweaks are needed in the Aadhaar program itself (designed by Nandan Nilekani, who is easily one among world’s top technocrats and philanthropists and his team that was led by super talented R.S. Sharma).

1.      Government must replace the old ACT and even rename it. THE AADHAAR (TARGETED DELIVERY OF FINANCIAL AND OTHER SUBSIDIES, BENEFITS AND SERVICES) ACT, 2016 should be renamed to THE AADHAAR, UNIQUE ID SYSTEM FOR INDIAN RESIDENTS, ACT 2018 (if it doesn’t want it to resemble, the UPA’s bill “National Identification Authority of India Bill, 2010”). Naturally the new bill must be discussed and voted both in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. Its scope should be expanded to include any application which demands online or offline identity authentication. AUTHENTICATING identity and LINKING Aadhaar number in external (to UIDAI) databases should be distinguished and unambiguously defined. At present 99.9% people don’t know the difference. Just disclosing one's Aadhaar number doesn't do anyone any harm, however, letting it get linked (stored) in myriad databases could be misused, especially by the State, to construct one's profile and perform clandestine surveillance. There should be no constraints on any service provider to utilise authentication services of UIDAI by use of VID because it provides unmatched cost-efficiency and reliability. Whole lot of infirmities in enrollment process and usage ambiguities that allow profiling and surveillance need to be done away with as has been pointed out in the SC verdict. The definition of “resident” needs to be tweaked for enrollment purposes, instead of 182 days, it could be reduced to 15 days. Aadhaar can and ought to be issued to foreigners or illegal immigrants who want to get one. It is the Voter Card (actually we need a Citizen ID as Voter ID excludes children) which confers benefits and rights and not a stand-alone Aadhaar number.

2.      Individual should have the option to offer Aadhaar number or VID when the request is for authenticating identity. Aadhar number cannot be demanded for authenticating except by named Government departments. Linking Aadhar number (seeding) should be highly restricted to named Government departments and any addition to the list should require parliamentary approval. For e.g. Aadhaar could be linked to Voter Card (in addition to PAN Card which is already mandated by Government and approved by SC). There is simply no case for linking Aadhaar number with bank accounts, mobile phones, DIN (in MCA’s portal), Driving License, Club memberships, Hotel bookings etc.

3.      Individual can query UIDAI and obtain a log of authentication requests – the program should be modified to show whether the requester was supplied VID or Aadhaar number. In case of VID, the log should show the VID supplied to the requester.

4.      The data privacy and data protection laws have got to be in place before any further linking of databases with Aadhaar number is demanded by the Government. B.N. Srikrishna Committee’s report has vague references to usage of personal data by the Government – “personal data may be processed by the government if this is considered necessary for any function of Parliament or State Legislature. This includes provision of services, issuing of licenses, etc.” Should these service providers be permitted to seed their databases with Aadhaar number or should they merely ask for VID for identity verification? It is extremely important to know the difference and the real purpose.

With Aadhaar2.0, security applications can be introduced in J & K and border States where forces can accost militants to establish their identity or citizenship. Electronic voting from anywhere can be enabled by Aadhaar linked Voter Card; citizenship or BPL status, when established reliably, enables the right people to avail benefits in various government schemes (SC erred in its ruling that Aadhaar should not be issued to illegal immigrants – it’s like putting the cart before the horse!); in future India can adopt referendum system routinely followed in Switzerland four times per year; Indian citizens may be asked to vote on important issues once a year. Advantage of ICT is that it can scale (it hardly matters India’s population is 150 times Switzerland’s). Why should India work with costly antiquated systems? Aadhaar 2.0 can do a lot to empower Indians, rich and poor, "bindaas" and security conscious, activists or dissidents alike!

Leveraging digital infrastructure - making schemes deliver desired outcomes

Nandan Nilekani praises 2018 budget for leveraging the digital infrastructure. He could have faulted the government on many policies which can be modified now that identifying and targeting beneficiaries is possible, but the same are being continued or will be continued mindlessly.

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/policy/data-oil-to-help-run-the-economy-on-the-digital-highway-nandan-nilekani-non-executive-chairman-infosys/articleshow/62747902.cms?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=ETTWMain

Here are a few schemes that can be improved with the help of sophisticated systems designed to  leverage the digital infrastructure available today.

1. Crop insurance – farmers and fields can be identified by using Aadhaar and GIS (satellite imagery – Geographical Information System); in case of crop failure, right compensation and timely disbursement can be made directly into the farmer’s account. The system will eliminate duplicate and ghost claims which have thwarted the crop insurance schemes leading to large scale farmers’ suicides across India. The cost – benefit of such a “sophisticated” system will be far better than loan waivers (last year Modi Government made loan waivers in excess of Rs.74K Crores; Rs. 34K Crores in UP alone). This system will be far more efficient than any insurance company’s systems and processes –the scheme can be implemented without bringing any insurance company in the loop!
2. Healthcare provision of Rs.5 lac per family – there is no need of bringing insurance companies in the loop. Using Aadhaar, families can be defined with non-duplicate members and direct cash transfer effected to empanelled (healthcare) service providers upon submission of their bills; the bills approval processes may be outsourced to insurance companies claims departments (efficient BPOs will come up and compete for claims processing). Big data analytics can reward efficient healthcare providers by directing more patients to them.
3. Free power to farmers should be stopped. Instead, DBT (Direct Benefits Transfer) based on scientific assessment can be made into farmer’s account. This will lead to avoidance of excessive water usage which is bad for the soil productivity and worse for the ecology (rapidly depleting water table).
4. Every child, using Aadhaar can be granted DBT for school fees – s/he can go to any empanelled school and receive credit for predetermined amount towards the fees. This will encourage competition among schools for higher quality education as the students will exercise choice.
5. Every individual entitled to low cost ration through the PDS should be free to buy the ration from any empanelled shop; the “sophisticated” system will make the payment to the shop to the extent of entitlement of the buyer. Shops will compete to provide better quality and low cost rations to customers as they will exercise choice; corrupt PDS shops will mend their ways very quickly.

One can think of many more examples of leveraging digital infrastructure and smart applications for disintermediation and creation of efficient and merit based ecosystem. In India we have enough talent to design and develop such systems.

The Aadhaar challenge and real issues - should we stop using computers if they are misused?

When computers were sought to be introduced in the banking and insurance sectors in India in 70s, the trade unions were spooked and they stalled computerisation on the specious ground that labour was cheap in India. This wisdom combined with protectionism resulted in imposition of 500% custom duty on electronics items and computers which continued until Rajiv Gandhi brought it down sharply. This spell of stupidity set India's development of indigenous electronics and computer software back by at least two decades. Argumentative Indians have strong opinions which is a virtue when backed with independent study - unfortunately most folks are lazy, they would rather argue and learn instead of learn and argue. Aadhaar is a terrific and elegant tool which should be replicated across the world, but due to inept politicians, poor legislation on data protection and privacy of data, argumentative Indians have enough "scoring points" to derail the project unless the Judiciary rises to the occasion.

Supreme Court is going to start hearing the petitions against the Aadhaar system from 17-Jan-2018. UIDAI (Unique Identification Authority of India) manages Aadhaar subject to the Aadhaar Act (published 16th March 2016: https://goo.gl/r77j8S). Individual’s right to privacy was settled in a landmark judgment by the Supreme Court of India (https://goo.gl/tGTwtV); a nine-judge bench unanimously ruled that the right to privacy was a fundamental right to be guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution of India – the right to privacy could be equated with the right to life and liberty. Now a five-judge bench will rule on the constitutional validity of Aadhaar being challenged by petitioners and objectors who fear that Aadhaar will be used (misused) as a tool for surveillance and it will exclude many from delivery of services, if it is made mandatory, due to constraints of its technology or Government’s reach.

Aadhaar identity system beats ALL other countries' systems in terms of its size & breadth, having registered over one billion Indian residents across all age groups and demographics, and its sophistication which enables identity authentication online in seconds. It is also an extremely lean system as it stores the minimum data that is essential for identification - it contains nothing extra. Unfortunately it is also a system that is grossly misunderstood which is only one reason it has raised the hackles of many; the second reason is the absence of data protection and privacy laws in India which heighten the risks consequent to linking of the permanent Aadhaar number with other databases in which an individual's information is available; unscrupulous politicians can utilise the State machinery to profile individuals to harass them and suppress dissent. The second reason begs reforms and new legislation including amendments in the Aadhaar Act; the Aadhaar program itself by no means deserves rejection.

Aadhaar's potential of transforming India in double quick time is proved through enablement of Direct Benefits Transfer and elimination of duplicate or ghost identities – Government claims having made cost savings higher than Rs.50K crores with partial implementations in LPG and PDS (Public Distribution System) (https://goo.gl/JRhfMt). The leaky subsidy programs of Government cost over Rs.4 lac crores p.a. and conservative estimates of leakages that can be fixed through Aadhaar are +40% or cost savings of Rs.1.6 lac crores p.a.. Aadhaar helps in targeted delivery of benefits – it short-circuits corrupt and inefficient bureaucratic systems and processes. Additionally, there are enormous unquantifiable benefits: inducement to “honest behaviour”; full inclusion of correct beneficiaries who were excluded or who were being short-changed. For e.g. just about 20% of PAN cards out of the 250 million issued by the Income Tax Department so far, belong to active tax payers so there must be many duplicates and fakes among the balance 80% which Aadhaar can help in invalidating (https://goo.gl/qQAyxv).

Having a good id system like Aadhaar alone is not enough. Its implementation cannot be safe without a framework of sensible and strong data protection and privacy laws. Access to Aadhaar should be permitted only after (1) defining proper protocols for querying Aadhaar database for each “use case” consistent with the data protection framework and (2) seeding myriad databases like PAN, Bank Accounts, Mobile Nos., Passports, PF/Pension Accounts should not be mandated without first having rules of data sharing and linking. Linking with the intent of 360 degree profiling could well be the hope (or agenda) of some politicians in power. Aadhaar id system cannot be blamed for the recent bamboozling by Government and many service providers to force everyone to link Aadhaar number with their databases - linking certainly impacts privacy and it is likely to be found objectionable by the Courts. Aadhaar database (Central Identity Repository) does NOT store any of the linked database references – it is designed to hold ONLY 1) Identity information (comprising demographics and biometrics data of individuals) and 2) authentication request records for a certain period; duration being determined by the Government.

Identity information in the Aadhaar system is meant to be used solely for establishing identity of an individual. The individual has three important rights: 1) update his/her demographic identity data, subject to verification for certain fields against specified documentary proof, 2) view the Authentication request records at any time and 3) deactivate or activate identity data sharing or authentication function of Aadhaar. Authentication request record contains the identity of requesting entity, date and time the request was made and the system response (Yes/No – i.e. to confirm or deny the authenticity of data contained in the request); the purpose of the request is not known nor stored.

What are the minimum set of protocols that should be followed and made known to public?

Use Case#1 Identity Authentication request (this function has been disclosed on UIDAI’s website)

An Identity Authentication request (i.e. an online query to Aadhaar System submitted by a Requesting Entity) should be allowed to be made by anyone supplying the Aadhaar number and any one demographic data (Name, Address, Postal Code, Date of Birth, email, gender, telephone number) or any one biometric data (fingerprint scan or iris scan). The System would give the response as “Yes” or “No”. The UIDAI website confirms the current system works exactly like this (https://goo.gl/ugNmSp). Such Requesting Entities don’t need any logins. Example of this Use Case: A security guard on being shown your Aadhar Number and Name can submit such a request through a smart phone app and obtain the answer Yes/No on his mobile; another Use Case: security guard can submit your Aadhaar number and ask you to touch a fingerprint scanner and obtain a Yes/No answer. In future Aadhaar system may include facial data points set as one of the biometric identity information, however, in that case it may want the Authentication request to contain one more demographic data, for e.g. Aadhaar no. + Name + Face; this is because facial recognition based on low quality cameras is less reliable than fingerprint or iris scan (https://goo.gl/NqLWpg).

Use Case#2 KYC confirmation – like banks or insurance companies require (this function is not fully or explicitly disclosed on UIDAI’s website)

The authorised Requesting Entity’s request (i.e. an online query to Aadhaar System) should be allowed to be made only with Logins assigned by UIDAI or UIDAI’s designated senior officers. With such an “empowered” Login, the user will get the required demographic data for any Aadhaar number submitted to the Aadhaar system; demographic data may include some or all of these fields: name, photo, address, postal code, date of birth, gender, email and phone number. There should be a defined process and submission of adequate documentation duly signed, preferably digitally, before creation of such empowered Logins by authorised officers whose id must also be stored. There should be a life cycle record maintained of assignment or blocking of such Logins. Aadhaar system should block suspicious usage from such Logins, for e.g. a) above threshold speed of successive requests and the period over which continuous requests occur would thwart subversion through Bots (robots which may attempt to suck all available data), b) quick successive requests from IP addresses which are from regions far apart and c) simultaneous requests from the same Login - would help to block users who have illegally got hold of a Login. UIDAI’s website should describe this process otherwise it would be misleading Aadhaar registrants into believing that their demographics data is never shared with anyone; on going through the UIDAI website one may believe that identity data is used ONLY for the Use Case of “authentication” in which Aadhaar system responds merely with a “Yes” or “No” response.

Use Case#3 Linking Aadhaar with another service provider's database - like Bank or Mobile Phone TELCO or Insurance company etc.

The service provider must have an individual's consent who must visit the office of the service provider or the individual himself or herself must link own Aadhaar number through an online process by visiting the service provider's portal. In the former Use case, the individual can confirm his/her consent by inputting an OTP received from Aadhaar system or touching a finger print scanner or peering into an iris scanner as required by the linking application running on the computer of the service provider. In the latter Use Case, the individual can confirm his/her consent after following the same authentication process. The linking process would require the service provider to store both the Aadhaar number and the Authentication Request reference number to which Aadhaar System has responded "Yes". If just the Aadhaar number is stored, it would not assure that the same was authenticated AND its linking consented to by the individual. 

If such empowered logins (Use Case#2) are created without proper protocols, as mentioned in the above para, the misuse of the type seen in the episode reported by The Tribune of 3rd January, 2018 will happen: A rogue designated officer or his agent, by using the relevant program execution rights, created an empowered Login (of Use Case#2 type) for Rachna Khaira who had offered to pay all of Rs.500 online –with this login, she claimed that she could access the demographic data of any of the 1.2 billion Aadhaar numbers. The Tribune story exposed the vulnerability of the protocol in place at UIDAI which had claimed that Aadhaar's data cannot leak out. As a matter of fact Aadhaar Act allows parting of demographics data for authentication but NEVER the biometric data. Incidentally, demographic data of all voters is in public domain and it can even be downloaded for distribution (https://goo.gl/DsczTp). The Tribune story was sensationalised as a “leak of 1.2 billion Aadhaar identity records”; this created an impression that the entire Aadhaar database had been copied in an unscrupulous way in another storage media freely available for distribution. Actually, nothing of the sort could have happened because the Aadhaar system would have undoubtedly blocked, one can safely bet, any attempt to retrieve multiple records at a high speed from any specific Login (even an empowered one). UIDAI filed an FIR against Rachna Khaira and this action compounded the suspicion of a cover up of its alleged blunder which had resulted in the whole database getting leaked. If Aadhaar system is designed with a proper audit trail, which undoubtedly must be the case, UIDAI ought not to take longer than few minutes to identify the rogue (or careless) designated officer who created, or who enabled an agent to create, the empowered Login called Anamika_6677 for the pseudo name Anamika that the Tribune's journalist had adopted (read her "dramatic" story here: https://goo.gl/v5F2xJ).

CEO of UIDAI, Ajay Bhushan Pandey writing in Economic Times of 14th January, 2018 (https://goo.gl/Zb14rQ) reiterated the safety of Aadhaar database without shedding light on the protocols UIDAI follows in creating such (Use Case#2) empowered Logins and the traceability of creation of such Logins; one would also like to know how many such Logins have been handed out? There was a news story that 5,000 such Logins were handed out to State officials and another one that 1 lac such Logins were created for CSCs (Common Services Centres) for VLEs (Village Level Entrepreneurs) who provide services to rural residents. Empowered logins are also allowed to print anyone’s Aadhaar card. Many people mistakenly think that printing an Aadhaar card is a breach –actually the Aadhaar card has little intrinsic value – one can equally well print Aadhaar demographic identity info on plain paper and it would be as good an id proof as the original Aadhaar card; even an electronic image of Aadhaar on a smart phone (download the app: mAadhaar) should serve as an “Aadhaar Card”. Aadhaar system offers all these capabilities, however, to prevent misuse of authorised Use Case#2 Logins, there should be a proper protocol and auditability process which should be published on UIDAI website. Hopefully Aadhaar has built all of these processes and protocols and all it needs to do is publish them. In any case there is no fear, based on any available evidence, that Aadhaar database in whole, is at risk of getting leaked out; UIDAI's website says the biometric identity data is encrypted, using the highest available level encryption algorithms, before storing in the CIDR. [It is highly improbable that any hacker can get to its CIDR data. Vendors who use Aadhaar authentication services are authorized by the UIDAI as Authorized User Agencies (AUAs). Each AUA must use an Authorized Service Agency (ASA) — these are the only entities allowed to connect to the CIDR. However, any software developer can write an Aadhaar authentication application using UIDAI's API (Application Programming Interface) components - the direct access to CIDR is thus prevented in case of common users.]

On UIDAI website’s “print media” page, various news reports were chronologically listed – Tribune story was NOT mentioned (https://goo.gl/YWdixi ) – this betrays a timidity that I found uncharacteristic of UIDAI of the past; during Nandan Nilekani’s tenure there would have been full disclosure for sure.

What does Nandan Nilekani have to say about the Aadhaar and the FIR filed by UIDAI?

Nandan says Aadhaar is safe and it will pass the data privacy test which is expected to be defined by the Supreme Court. He said Aadhaar is being maligned through a sustained campaign (https://goo.gl/AiBMhu story of 15th January 2018). He complimented the proposed introduction of the “Virtual Id” facility. CEO of UIDAI had said in his above mentioned ET article of 14th January 2018, that this facility was debated nine years ago but was kept in abeyance.

Now that data privacy concerns are threatening the idea of Aadhaar, the “Virtual Id” facility will serve to address some people’s concerns. As the Virtual Id will be perishable (it has a finite life of few days defined by the user who can generate Virtual Ids any number of times) it will serve to authenticate one’s Id but it will prevent 360-degree profiling which can happen if the permanent Aadhaar number is provided to a service provider or an authority. For e.g. if Aadhaar number is stored in databases of PAN, Banks, Mobile service providers, Passport, PF or Pension Funds, National Crime Record Bureau's database etc. then someone duly authorised by any department of the Government or through a Court Order (and not from UIDAI – because it is not in its mandate) can pull all the records together and create a 360-degree view of an individual through processing of a query by the Aadhaar number. However, if Virtual Id (with its time stamp) is stored in all these databases then it is not possible to link the relevant records of an individual in different databases and form a 360-degree profile; this defeats the nefarious design of a “surveillance state” [same Virtual Id can get allotted to another person, after its expiry, however, at a given instant one Virtual Id will be mapped to only one Aadhaar]. The Virtual Id idea is good in theory, however, the Government is known to change its rules and it could well force individuals to supply their permanent Aadhaar number instead of a Virtual Id. Already there were news reports that Income Tax Department has been empowered to find addresses from “PAN linked Aadhaar numbers” and pursue “missing” tax payers whereas CEO of UDIAI said on 14th January 2018 that individuals need not supply permanent Aadhaar number to any authority including IT Department or Banks (https://goo.gl/gyY6tP).

PRESCRIPTIONS going forward:

1) Introducing Facial recognition as one of the biometrics along with one demographic attribute for authentication in the Aadhaar system is a good idea (https://goo.gl/wKbpRL ). It will serve to enhance inclusivity of Aadhaar – some people do not have fingerprints which can be scanned and matched easily.

2) India needs stronger data protection laws and enhanced respect for individual’s privacy. Aadhaar system properly implemented does not impinge on individual’s privacy. For e.g. the Aadhaar enrollment agents have been caught selling individual's data - these people should be jailed rather than fined. 

3) Investment in implementing Aadhaar is probably less than rupees 10K crores. It has paid back this investment many times over within couple of years. In future it can save lacs of crore rupees p.a. and it can increase the honesty coefficient of Indians in a very significant way which is priceless. It will help serve for the first time, many genuine beneficiaries who have been left out or who have been short-changed by the corrupt.

4) A well designed multi-media campaign (TV, Press, Radio, Cinema and Hoardings) is required to explain i) what Aadhar is and what it is NOT, ii) how and why to generate Virtual Id and iii) precautions the individual must take at the time of linking Aadhaar with a service provider's database [to ensure that the agency asking to link Aadhaar is so authorised by the Government and that the agent is running the right program for linking and it is not a facade behind which another operation is being performed (for e.g. if the agent has user's bank account number, he could transfer funds when you provide your OTP or get your finger print or iris scanned on his devices)].

5) Government must recognise the difference between the needs of "authentication" and "linking". The former serves to verify identity (when you supply a Virtual Id), the latter helps in profiling (when you link your permanent Aadhaar number). Government should MINIMISE the Aadhaar linking drive with the permanent Aadhaar number. Government should provide individuals the option of linking the temporary Virtual Id which will serve authentication requirement. Those who were coerced to link their permanent Aadhaar number should be allowed to substitute it with the Virtual Id (alternatively they should be allotted another Aadhaar number). These "needs" should be debated - I would recommend linking Election Card, Ration Card, PAN Card, Driving License, Land Purchase Registrations, Crime Records but not Banking Accounts or Mobile Numbers which should use Aadhaar only for authentication.

6) Modi Government was ill advised to pass Aadhaar bill as a money bill in Lok Sabha, presumably to save itself the blushes in Rajya Sabha. [Jai Ram Ramesh has filed a petition challenging introduction of Aadhaar as a money bill]. This indeed displays a lack of understanding, in Modi Government, of the utility of Aadhaar. Aadhaar is not just a tool for efficient targeted delivery of monetary benefits, it is also a security enhancing tool. For e.g. militants using fake identities will be deterred from operations in Kashmir if everyone in the State is forced to have an Aadhaar id. Ironically, Aadhaar Act excludes the State of J&K!! Aadhaar Act needs to be modified on both counts, to expand its scope and applicability across whole India. Even the name of the Act should be changed: From The Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and other Subsidies, benefits and services) Act, 2016 to The Aadhaar (Unique Id System for Indian residents anywhere in the World).