Afghanistan seeks India’s help to build national biometric database

Afghanistan wants to introduce an Aadhaar system similar to the Indian biometric and demographic database so it has partnered with India for guidance, reports Outlook India.

Afghanistan Central Civil Registration Authority (ACCRA) met in December with Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India and Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to understand how Aadhaar works, how births and deaths are registered, methodology behind the tool and to get a live software demo.

Afghanistan has a population of more than 32 million people and is struggling to fight terrorism, poverty, malnutrition and corruption.

President Ashraf Ghani is asking for India’s help to build capacity in key areas and an Aadhaar-like system is a top priority. In November, officials from National Statistics and Information Authority, Afghanistan by Foreigners Regional Registration Office, New Delhi participated in a capacity building program to improve the immigration process.

India is Afghanistan’s top development and capacity building partner, with many training and scholarship opportunities from which over 3,500 Afghans have so far benefited.

Last year, Afghanistan began registering the biometric data of all civil service employees and spent $15 million on 17,865 Demalog biometric devices for use in national elections. Dermalog caught 88,000 votes were fraudulent and invalidated.

Article Topics

Afghanistan  |  biometric data  |  biometric database  |  biometrics  |  data collection  |  identity management  |  India