E-Governance News: 29/4/10

ID PROGRAMME FACES FIRST CHALLENGE OVER PRIVACY, DATA
Venkatesha Babu & Karen Leigh, Bangalore/New Delhi
Mint  

In the first significant challenge to the government’s ambitious programme to give more than one billion Indians a unique identification number, a group of NGOs are planning to take the government to court over a range of issues, including concerns over privacy and the safety of information. About 100 NGOs, including Alternative Law Forum, Centre for Internet and Society, have come together to oppose the implementation of the project in its current form.

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) “is not a statutory body, not having been created by any Act or under any law, but by executive fiat”, he said. “It is set up as an appendage to the Planning Commission. It cannot be scrutinized either by Parliament or the Comptroller and Auditor General.” In what had been expected to become a hurdle to the project, those against it are citing data protection and privacy, factors that led to the failure of a similar initiative in the UK.

IT ROAD MAP FOR GOA IN 6 MONTHS
Panaji
The Hindu

The Goa government will form an IT Task Force to create an IT road map for Goa within six months. Chief Minister Digambar Kamat made this announcement here at an interactive programme with the Goa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) on Tuesday.

IT TRAINING COS VIE FOR UID DEAL
New Delhi
The Economic Times

The announcement by Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) of a large IT and biometrics training tender to train over 1 lakh enrolling agents on Wednesday has thrown up new opportunities for large training companies like NIIT, Aptech and Jetking, spread across the country.

The UIDAI plans to train about 1.04 lakh agents and will need about 430 centres across major capitals in the country over the next four years. Each enrollment centre would have to complete at least 60 enrollments to complete the massive target of enrolling 1.2 billion people by 2014-15.

India’s largest IT training company NIIT is already is making plans to bid for the project. Second largest IT training company Aptech CEO Ninad Karpe said that his company would bid for both testing and training components of the project.