Your Aadhaar number on sale for Rs 500
NEW DELHI : BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha slammed “politics of vendetta” after the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) filed an FIR against The Tribune reporter for exposing alleged Aadhaar leaks.
The actor-turned MP said, “A journalist is hauled up for reporting alleged truth about malfunctioning and misuse of Aadhaar. Are we living in a Banana Republic?”.He tweeted, “What kind of “justice” is this? Is there only politics of vendetta? Even public is being victimised for coming out honestly for society and the nation”.
Shatrughan Sinha also congratulated the Editors Guild of India for condemning the FIR against The Tribune reporter Rachna Khaira for her article on how anonymous users accessed Aadhaar details and sold it for a fee.
“I congratulate the Editors’ Guild of India for strongly taking up this matter and going deep into this. Hope, wish and pray that genuine authorities in the government and the respected SC in particular will take notice and come with swift corrective measures. Satyamev Jayate! Jai Hind!” Sinha said.
The Tribune report of January 3 by Khaira had exposed how, for a small sum of money made to a payment bank, an agent of a private group would allegedly create a gateway to access details contained in an individual’s Aadhar card.
Using a false identity, Khaira had posed as an interested party and claimed in her report that she had easy access to details that individuals had listed in their Aadhar cards. The UIDAI in a statement had subsequently denied that any data breach was possible.
The Editors Guild of India on Sunday had called the FIR against the reporter as “unfair, unjustified and a direct attack on the freedom of the press”. “Instead of penalising the reporter, UIDAI should have ordered a thorough internal investigation into the alleged breach and made its findings public,” the Editors Guild said in a statement.
The Tribune reporter Rachna Khaira has been booked under sections 419 (punishment for cheating by impersonation), 420 (cheating), 468 (forgery) and 471 (using forged document) of the Indian Penal Code, section 66 of the IT Act, and section 36/37 of the Aadhaar Act.(With Agency Inputs ),
