No Subsidy Diversion Without Aadhaar Holder’s Informed Consent; UIDAI Issues Directives To NPCI, Banks

In the wake of controversy regarding LPG subsidy diversion to Airtel Payments Bank while linking Airtel mobile number with Aadhaar, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has issued directives to banks and the National Payments’ Corporation of India (NPCI).

The UIDAI has directed the NPCI not to allow override request pertaining to an Aadhaar holder unless it is accompanied by the name of his current bank on the Aadhaar Payments Mapper and confirmation from the requesting bank that it has obtained the requisite consent of the Aadhaar holder for switching to the requesting bank on the mapper.

Huge controversy had erupted when many people complained that when an Aadhaar holder visits the telecom service provider for verifying his mobile number with Aadhaar, Airtel is opening his payment bank account and putting that bank account on NPCI’s APB mapper, overriding the existing bank account mapping, without the informed consent of the Aadhaar holder.

As an aftermath, the Airtel had reportedly offered to return Rs 190 crore subsidy that had flown into its payments Bank accounts of its 31 lakh mobile phone subscribers.

There were also complaints that many banks are seeding Aadhaar on NPCI APB mapper overriding existing bank account mapping without informed consent of the residents.

“As per the extant instructions, every bank has to obtain express consent of the individual before putting his bank account on the mapper. Non-compliance of these instructions at the ground level is leading to aforesaid complaints and inconvenience to account holders,” the UIDAI said.

The following directives have been issued by UIDAI to banks and NPCI:

• NPCI shall allow override request pertaining to an Aadhaar holder only if it is accompanied by the name of his current bank on the APB mapper and confirmation from the requesting bank that it has obtained the requisite consent of the Aadhaar holder for switching to the requesting bank on the mapper.


• Till above is implemented, NPCI shall disable the override feature on the APB mapper immediately.


• Banks shall send request for mapping of a new account or overriding an existing bank account to NPCI only after taking explicit informed consent of their customers.


• Banks shall inform each account holder through SMS and email within 24 hours that a request has been sent to NPCI to put his bank account on the mapper or, as the case may be, to change his bank account on the NPCI mapper (providing the name of current bank on the mapper and the last four digits of the account number of the new bank alongwith the bank name) and in case he does not want to put his new bank account on the mapper, then the customer should be provided a methodology to reverse this mapping.


• If a customer does not have email or mobile number and communication as per para 4.4 cannot be sent, then his physical signature on a paper consent form should be obtained prior to sending the request to NPCI mapper.


• The records of consents obtained in Para 4.3 and the communications made in Para 4.1, 4.3, and 4.4 and scanned copy of the consent form in Para 4.5. shall be retained for 7 years by the banks as per the UIDAI regulations.


• Banks and NPCI shall make available the aforesaid records at the time of audit as per the provisions of the Aadhaar (Authentication) Regulations, 2016.