My duplicate unique identity

Yes, the identity I am talking about is of course Aadhaar — The unique biometric based identity. I had one.

I did not use it for any purpose so far. When I read that I need to link the Aadhaar number to my PAN to file my income tax, I went to income tax website to do so, but I could not. The date of birth is missing in Aadhaar. It had year of birth, which was any way wrong.

To correct this, I need to update my Aadhaar records. I can do that, but it need a linked mobile number to send one time password. I don’t have one. So went to an Aadhaar enrollment center to update my mobile number. Along with that my biometric details were also updated(that is 10 fingers and 2 iris scans). Date of birth also updated.

A few weeks later, I checked if that update is processed in UIDAI website. There is a provision to verify the mobile phone number. When I tried, the website said, my Aadhaar is not valid!

There is another utility in UIDAI website to check the Aadhaar update status and it said my Aadhaar number is cancelled due to duplicate!

I went to nearby Aadhaar enrollment center again, and asked them. They did not had any clue and told me they never seen this kind of issue. So I tried to call the toll free number listed in error message. That number is would not work. I guessed and tried just 1947 and it worked. The customer care people asked my Aadhaar update number and told me that everything is updated and Aadhaar number is valid. They did not accept when I mentioned the error message I got from website and just disconnected the call.

I tried with income tax website to see if I can link my Aadhaar if it is valid. I got this error:

No idea what the customer care people were referring. I decided to write to customer care email of UIDAI with these screenshots. They replied in 24 hours:

Dear Resident,

Thank you for bringing this matter to our notice.

Your case (20170611006147) has been registered with us. Please find below our response against your query:

Query 1(Subcase Id :2017061100614701)
Kindly check the Aadhaar status at UIDAI's resident portal and get your Biometrics updated in case of Suspended Aadhar and Re-enroll in case of Cancelled Aadhar by visiting nearest Permanent Enrollment Centre.

So, I am supposed to get a new Aadhaar number? Let us try to get some sense out of this situation.

1. How did my Aadhaar end up as duplicate? To match my finger prints and iris scan with somebody, the biometric matching technology must be so unreliable. From my limited reading, it is.
2. Can the UIDAI cancel my Aadhaar without any notice? They can, they do. Over 85 lakh numbers have been deactivated since 2010, without notice and in the absence of proper grievance redressal.
3. When was my Aadhaar cancelled? I don’t know and I don’t think there is a way to know this. I got this aadhaar number 5 years back. Since I never used it or gave to anybody, there is no authentication happened with it. In April, when I went to an Akshaya center for updating phone number, they retrieved my details with the number and updated. Can they do if aadhaar is cancelled? I don’t know.
4. Suppose I used this number for any government benefits. A lot of people do. What will happen to them when aadhaar is cancelled in a bad day? That is too scary and unimaginable.
5. What exactly meant by cancellation of Aadhaar? Will the system have my record? If so if I try to re-enroll won’t that be a duplicate since it will match my biometric? I don’t know. I asked this in help@uidai.gov.in, I got a template reply to visit aadhaar enrollment center.
6. What is the difference between cancelled Aadhaar and suspended Aadhaar? I asked this in help@uidai.gov.in, I got a template reply to visit nearest Aadhaar enrollment center.

Updates:

From twitter I got a clue that the update might be actually a new enrollment. I never imagined that, since my update slip looks like this:

Anyway I used it to check the enrollment status of new aadhaar and it worked!

So what will happen now? Will I get my second unique Id?