An Airtel SIM card replacement procedure with Aadhaar takes just four hours while without an Aadhaar card it may take up to four days. Mr Ranjith Raj of the non-profit organisation Swecha FSMI lost his SIM card and sought a replacement. He took to Twitter to seek help.
A representative from Airtel informed him that it was not mandatory to have Aadhaar-based authentication. "It is a faster SIM replacement process compared to the document-based procedure so we recommend it," he said. This information was soon retracted. Airtel then stated that the duplicate SIM card with Aadhaar authentication would be activated in four hours. Using any other identity, issuing a duplicate SIM and its activation would take four days.
Mr Raj, who has been creating awareness about the UID, said, “They deleted the information when I said Aadhaar was not mandatory. For four days I will not have a SIM, which is ridiculous. Aadhaar is dystopian by design and I do not want to share it."
Airtel was not available for comment. Other telecom firms have similar policies. A BSNL customer service executive said they needed an Aadhaar card to issue a SIM card. A representative said, "We need to do manual verification by going to the person’s residence and this takes time.”
The Supreme Court has clarified that Aadhaar is not mandatory for getting SIM cards.
Independent security researcher Srinivas Kodali said, "SIM cards can be easily purchased at airports and vending machines. Here the responsibility has been put on the consumer. The risks of linking Aadhaar with SIM cards is known.” A distributor in Hyderabad managed to activate 6,000 SIMs using fingerprints and Aadhaar numbers harvested from property registration documents in June.
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