Hassan DC complains about staff at Aadhaar centre ‘creating fake birth certificates’

A file photo of a special camp for Aadhaar enrollment.
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

An employee at the Aadhaar centre in the Deputy Commissioner’s office in Hassan, in Karnataka, has been accused of creating fake birth certificates to generate Aadhaar cards.

On August 30, Hassan DC C. Sathyabhama complained to the police to take action against Anushree, who had been working at the Aadhaar centre for more than two years. The district administration hired her through an outsourcing agency.

Vijay Kumar, an official of the Unique Identification Authority of India, met the DC in Hassan and informed her about the alleged fraudulent activity. The official, in his preliminary inquiry, found that the accused allegedly created fake birth certificates of applicants for money and used them for Aadhaar generation.

“According to our inquiry, she created 13 fake certificates. We have to investigate further to find the actual number of records she created,” Vijay Kumar told the media.

Explaining the process, the official said, applicants should have original birth certificates for the Aadhaar card process. “For those who did not possess originals, the accused would create records by changing the name on scanned copies of original records received from other applicants. The parents would remain the same, only the applicants’ names would be added,” he said.

Reacting to this issue, former MLA A.T. Ramaswamy, in a press conference on August 31, demanded an investigation in detail to identify all those involved. “This seems to be a big case involving many,” he said.