UIDAI ties up with LIC,may partner banks

After roping in LIC as its first institutional partner in the unique identification (UID) project,the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is looking at banks as its partners in the project. As this’s a huge database project,we are even looking at banks as our partners in the future,” UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani said while signing a memorandum of understanding with LIC here on Wednesday. When asked about the deal that will permit UIDAI to use LIC database,Nilekani said,Anyway,we are not going to use the LIC database fully,but certain authentication details to be included in our project. The authority also will be tying up with more registrars for a quicker roll-out of the numbers.

UID is a project of national importance and a great challenge for us to implement due to the tight deadlines, LIC chairman TS Vijayan said. When asked the impact on the LIC business following the MoU,Vijayan said,Our business will also benefit through the association. This project will help LIC in catering to customers with multiple policies as everybody will start having one unique number,while LICs initiatives in social schemes like micro-insurance will also get a fillip. Nilekani said the UIDAI will be taking certain fields from LICs database of over 21-crore policy-holders like the name,address,date of birth,sex and biometrics.