Recently, in our track on e-governance and the UID, we covered e-passports and a brief article on database aggregation for the UID scheme.
Now, after e-passports comes the time of e-birth certificates. Along with UID in-charge Nandan Nilekani, the Health Ministry is proposing a scheme to give health cards and birth certificates online. “We were discussing it yesterday (Wednesday) over dinner. I proposed it to him,” Dinesh Trivedi, minister of state for health, said on Thursday while inaugurating the Life Science Conclave in New Delhi. A copy of the birth certificate is quite essential and getting an official copy of it is not quite that simple.
Apparently the Health Ministry is still “brainstorming” over it. They realised a transition from the current system is essential. The concept is simple – a person should be able to access the Internet and manage a printout of his birth-certificate. Trivedi had said in a news article that the e-birth certificate will have the entire history of the newborn – weight, vaccination, any birth problem and other related information – and all these will be available on the net.
Though simple in conceptualisation, the implementation issues might be more difficult. For example, as of now, a photocopy of your birth certificate is not considered legitimate unless it is attested / notarized.
Will the same come into play? Who can access these records? If its stored online, will the UID act as the password? Online security is still a major issue and identity issues could come into play.
However, from my perspective, if the details regarding implementation can be worked, the concept by itself is good. Having easy access to official personal documents would be quite helpful. Any comments? What other issues could come up during implementation?
