The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has deactivated over two crore Aadhaar numbers of deceased individuals as part of a nationwide clean-up effort to maintain the continued accuracy of the Aadhaar database. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology said that UIDAI sourced this data from Registrar General of India, States and Union Territories. It added that no Aadhaar number is ever re-assigned to another individual.
The Ministry said that in case of the death of a person, it is essential that his or her Aadhaar number is deactivated to prevent potential identity fraud, or unauthorised usage of such Aadhaar number for availing welfare benefits. Meanwhile, UIDAI has asked Aadhaar number holders to report the death of their family members on myAadhaar Portal after obtaining their death certificate from the death registering authorities. The authority had launched a facility earlier this year named ‘Reporting of death of a family member’ on the myAadhaar Portal for deaths registered in 25 states and Union Territories presently using Civil Registration System.
