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Nandan Nilekani and National ID Card project

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219 users have liked.
Will work out just fine
67% (37 votes)
Will end like Mr NRN Murthy and BIAL
33% (18 votes)
Total votes: 55

Comments

kbsyed61's picture

NN - I wish you all the best and a grand success!

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150 users have liked.

Shri Nandan Nilekani,

On behalf of Praja I wish you all the best and a grand success in this endeavor.

SB,

I am really surprised with this VOTE post of yours. My gut feeling or predication about NN's new job would not change anything on the ground. Neither it is going to help NN nor his project.

It is like opposition party doing a HOMA in anticipation that Dr. Singh would lose his PM job while he was on foreign tour 4 years back. 4 years later, Dr. Singh is still the PM and he is more stronger politically as well. The point is our predictions, feelings would not help either the NN nor his assigned job. What would help is our humble suggestions, sincere criticism and truthful, unbiased analysis of the tasks, risks etc.

Even if we all agree that he will also be failure like NRN, Prof. Ashwin I am sure NN will just move on. Do you remember Sam Pitroda? The powerful nexus of bureaucrats, Public sector officers, suppliers and foreign telecoms company might have succeeded in shunting Sam from Indian telecoms, but didn't he made India and Indians proud by succeeding in giving made in India electronic exchange within 3 years, where as AT&T, Alactel took more than 10-20 years? He infused that confidence in engineering community that showed Indians are no less skillful. People think that IT changed the India and its new emergence on world stage. Actually it was not. Telecom did it and Sam Pitroda's efforts that saw India taking leap in telecom infrastructure. Otherwise we would either be stuck with strowgear exchanges or still importing Alcatel or Siemens technology. It is Telecom infrastructure that supported the spread and growth of IT. Imagine Offshore SW dev in India without telecom's leased/Sat lines to europe and US?

So the effort should be to help NN and his project with PRAJA style discussions, suggestions, outright rejection etc. I do hope NN will Praja community to be much more helpful and useful resource at his disposal.

Syed

Vasanthkumar Mysoremath's picture

NN's acceptance itself is half the battle won...

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149 users have liked, including you.

 

National ID card is a long cherished dream of a developing country like India.  I feel it is time for us to understand that change is the essence of life and the job is being executed by none other than an expert in the field of IT and he knows how to execute it with corporate touch and INFY is his testimony. 

- 'Nothing is going to change Indians' is passe and since development is a continuous process, it is time for all of us Prajas to look at the way forward for an India that can lead its poorest of the poor to the destiny of inclusive development which is the foundation of a democracy. 

- National ID card is only a beginning.

- All the best Nandan - go ahead - deliver and show to the world that India is a power to recognise and has the ability to take care of its masses with the help of IT to make their life that much comfortable by flaunting the ID card.

- Vasanthkumar Mysoremath

silkboard's picture

Much needed and all the best

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150 users have liked.

All for it and all the best to Mr Nilekani.

Syed avare - I had to post a poll to test that the feature didn't break after recent upgrade, and one needless debate on this subject at office today had me wondering if more people think that Nandan's appointment doesn't mean automatic success. Perhaps not a Praja-style post, hope moderators will be kind on my first offence :)

Skeptics are citing election commission's performance on Voter Id Cards. The argument is that it is a hard job.

Regardless, I am curious if there are successful examples of such big nationally linked database in our country - esp inside government network?

PAN card may be the biggest nationally linked DB inside government. Or would it be the DB holding Railway's reservation details?

700 million or so entries, discounting 300 million underaged teens and kids. That does seem bigger than subscriber registries of Airtel or BSNL or Reliance Telecoms. Bigger than SBI's customer database?

Go Nandan go. I bet you know that technology would NOT be the issue here.

idontspam's picture

Skeptical not pessimistic

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140 users have liked.

 In the interest of full disclosure I voted he wont succeed. Not because I dont want him to but that there are too many rickety systems that need to be changed as well.

It is going to be a federated model. Meaning there have to be local agencies with applications that will issue the number and consolidate centrally in a virtual model. We have to wait for the details. The roadmap has to be studied and the participating agencies capability questioned and evaluated for capability. He will need to put in lot of professionalism in each of these touch points else it will end up like the Bangalore police case with crime scene detection machines.

God speed NN

s_yajaman's picture

What are the benefits to the political class?

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140 users have liked.

For me this is the fundamental question.  What do they gain?  Or what do they lose because this is not in place.

Dr.MMS' intentions might be honourable but the political class can be a formidable opponent if they don't want this through.  If there are vote banks they will lose because of this then you can rest assured that this is a still born baby. 

Key skill needed in this is political and not technology.  Identifying touch points, power structures (breaking some if needed), building consensus for the need and the methodology among others.  First big leap forward will be learning to swim with the sharks (other Cabinet Ministers and MPs) and feel comfortable in his new role.  Indian politics is not for the faint hearted.  I remember Amitabh Bachchan getting elected as an MP in 1984 but apparently he did not say a single word in Parliament. 

I hope he succeeds because it will mean that decent people stand a chance in the quagmire that Indian politics is. 

Srivathsa

 

Drive safe.  It is not just the car maker which can recall its product.

poowonder's picture

NID to change history of India- MSTT predicts...

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141 users have liked.


Looks Interesting....

The Union government's ambitious National ID Card project could be the single biggest event that can change the history of the nation, the country's IT security platform, Micro Secure Think Tank (MSTT) has predicted.

Presenting its findings and projections here today, MSTT said the size and scale would be the largest attempted and would take three-five years for its impact to register on individuals and society.

''Though we are habituated to look for results in a very short time, we would like to appeal to the society and the press to be patient before passing any judgement,'' MSTT president Vijay Mukhi said on the occasion.

The benefits of the ID project would be visible in cases of medical emergencies and election. In case of medical emergencies, vital information regarding the patients blood-group, allergies and medical records stored in the card can be used to save his or her life.

The smart card would also make it easier for people to fulfill their rights and duties as citizens through online voting.

The smart ID card will, however, also come with risks and dangers, said the report. Prominent among the risk is misuse of personal data. ''We cannot prevent our National ID card from being stolen, but we can ensure no personal information is stored on the card. A lot of people believe that if the data is encrypted, it would be protected from misuse. We are yet to see an encryption that cannot be broken using different methods. We must assume an environment where connectivity, especially wireless, will be given. If we store data on the smart card itself, it will be misused,'' the report stated.

The report also suggested that transparency of the funds invested should be the order of the day. Following the US, the report said, ''We must use the xBRL so that no one can accuse the Government of corruption as everything is on the web and transparent using technology.'' It also advocated inviting hackers and crackers to test the security of the ID Card system, and said the government must anticipate this threat when designing the card. ''There is one certainity with smart cards-they will get hacked, cracked and broken into. The government will say they are tamper-proof, but some hackers will break the security surrounding it. The card will find itself in the hands of every government. There is no such thing as 100 per cent security,'' the report warned.

''Security must be an open and not a closed process. We expect the government to actually conduct international hacking conferences and offer a reward of USD one million for the first hacker. Anyone in the world who wants to experiment with the card must be offered one, so that the government would know how strong its security is. Our belief is that the first lot of cards should be broken very easily,'' Mr Mukhi said.

Link :http://news.webindia123.com/news/Articles/India/20090630/1286302.html

bhagyavana's picture

national ID card is only the solution for many problems of India

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140 users have liked.

Congradulation and All the best to Nandan sir

Really it is very timely choice to be the head of National ID card in India, It is only the solution in Indian administration to implement many development project effectively and successfully, like electing the our govrnment, reaching the root level of soceity in distribution and monitoring, we can effectively have internl and external security in India.

 

Go ahed sir, all the best

 

Bhagyavana S.M

Chief Information officer, E-governanceUnit, GOK, Bangalore, Karnataka

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