Aadhaar, India’s digital ID platform, was integrated with social assistance programmes to increase their efficiency and promote transparency. This reform aimed to enable targeted distribution to eligible beneficiaries, reduce reliance on human intermediaries and curb leakages. However, human involvement remains critical to last-mile delivery of services, especially in more complex delivery programmes (Chaudhuri, 2019; Madon et al., 2022). Even amidst the digital transition, some processes exist within a black box, posing obstacles to accountability.
It is important to understand the role of people, i.e. state officials, retail shop owners, and other private actors, in implementing social assistance programmes across various contexts, and develop accountability mechanisms concurrently. Generating reliable and frequent data to verify claims on distribution of benefits is a critical step in this direction.
The debate on Aadhaar-integrated social assistance programmes
Biometric authentication is considered accurate in identifying eligible populations under welfare schemes, therefore contributing to targeted distribution (Mir et al., 2019). It has been particularly beneficial in improving access to services in low literacy settings where beneficiaries may face difficulties accessing passwords (Muralidharan et al., 2016). Additionally, biometric authentication can mitigate leakages, specifically, diversions to ghost beneficiaries (Sud & VanSandt, 2016).
Conversely, studies have highlighted the limitations and risks of implementing biometric authentication as part of these programmes. Some experts caution against the potential to deploy this technology for surveillance, and for profiling citizens in the absence of robust legal safeguards (Arora, 2016; Krishna, 2020). Moreover, numerous assessments describe how exclusion remains a challenge when this technology is used for non-negotiable judgements on who is entitled to what (Drèze et al., 2017; Chaudhuri, 2020). The exclusion of genuine beneficiaries upon failed authentication invariably expands reliance on intermediaries, albeit this contradicts the primary objective of Aadhaar’s integration with such programmes. These individuals help bypass the system and access benefits.
The pronounced role of intermediation in managing authentication failures and more complex distribution systems
The discretion exercised by people at the front-line service improves provision, but is also accompanied by issues like discrimination and the diversion of benefits (Hundal & Chaudhuri, 2020; Drèze et al., 2017).
A study on the Aadhaar-enabled Public Distribution System (AePDS) in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan illustrate how informal practices among Fair Price Shop Owners (FPSOs) helped mitigate exclusion by overriding authentication failures (Chaudhuri, 2019). The role of private actors, including NGOs and kiosk operators, in enabling access has also been documented in this context.
Local intermediaries’ play a decisive role in contexts where provision is adapted based on local knowledge about changing requirements of beneficiaries. A study on the Aadhaar-enabled Fertiliser Distribution System (AeFDS), for instance, brings out the centrality of intermediation in determining the quantity and type of fertiliser distributed (Madon et al., 2022). Alongside tracking the distribution of fertilisers to entitled farmers, AeFDS is aimed to promote the appropriate use of fertilisers: an ePoS device in retail shops, upon authenticating entitled beneficiaries, suggests optimal types and quantities of fertilisers. The suggestions are based on information including soil health, the crop being cultivated and the type of irrigation—procured from sources such as the Webland and Soil Health databases. However, given the evolving demand for fertilisers and changing crop cultivation patterns, local intermediaries introduced amendments to bypass the suggestions of the ePoS (Madon et al., 2022). For example, they tend to provide higher quantities for farmers who work on more land than reflected in the Webland database or provide different fertilisers due to changing crop cultivation patterns. The local adminstration’s knowledge and processes are shown to inadvertently play a role in determining the accessibility and adaptability of delivery systems, underscoring the need for people to anchor technology.
Since diversions and discrimination accompany human intermediation, it remains critical to concurrently deliberate and develop accountability mechanisms to address risks linked to the undesirable exercise of discretion. This is particularly important in situations where intermediaries amend or bypass established procedures for provision.
As a first step, the larger implications of amending established procedures for provision need to be observed and understood. Regarding AeFDS specifically, when greater quantities of fertiliser are granted to those believed to cultivate more land than they are shown to own, to what extent is there supervision to minimise misuse or overuse? Moreover, when a retailer’s register mentions the provision of fertiliser (or ration) to a legitimate beneficiary without an Aadhaar card, what are the processes or mechanisms to verify the exceptions noted by the retailer?
Deliberating a pathway to create accountability in intermediary-driven provision systems
The need for mechanisms that generate visibility
There is a need to reconcile administrative data on distribution, with frequently and independently collected data on ground realities. This creates visibility, allowing an insight into the discretion exercised in implementing programmes like AePDS and AeFDS and the nature of leakages. The development of visibility mechanisms may constitute first steps. However, as incentives to syphon benefits persist and evolve, robust accountability mechanisms need to be constantly deliberated across contexts to mitigate opaque practices.
A study on Aadhaar-enabled National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) payments in Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand highlights the role of surveys in understanding the impact of the payment system reforms on beneficiaries (Muralidharan et al., 2021). It reveals the potential of real-time data on beneficiaries’ experience in identifying exclusion and verifying administrative data or claims on distribution. There is merit in assessing the feasibility and efficacy of such channels of grievance redress in identifying corrupt practices, across distribution systems and states. This also reinforces the potential of large-scale surveys like those conducted by the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) in enabling an empirical understanding on the kinds of leakages and the extent to which these persist (Muralidharan et al., 2021).
Integrating local knowledge systems to structure distribution
Furthermore, some have explored the potential of synchronising local government applications with the more centralised Aadhaar-enabled systems like the AeFDS (Ghani, 2020; Madon et al., 2022). This is expected to contribute to the structured interpretation of local bodies of knowledge, which then determines distribution. Essentially, decision-making at the local level would be encouraged, but with certain guardrails. However, a more pressing challenge here is to foster local capabilities to regularly source and analyse reliable information, based on which distribution and associated outcomes are measured. The integration of local databases with centralised systems may not contribute to effective distribution and greater accountability, if local bodies’ are under-equipped to collect and analyse data efficiently.
References
Arora, P. (2016). Bottom of the Data Pyramid: Big Data and the Global South. International Journal of Communication, 10(0), 19. https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/4297
Bhatia, A., & Bhabha, J. (2017). India’s Aadhaar scheme and the promise of inclusive social protection. Oxford Development Studies, 45(1), 64–79. https://doi.org/10.1080/13600818.2016.1263726
Chaudhuri, B. (2019). Paradoxes of Intermediation in Aadhaar: Human Making of a Digital Infrastructure. South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 42(3), 572–587. https://doi.org/10.1080/00856401.2019.1598671
Chaudhuri, B. (2020). Distant, opaque and seamful: seeing the state through the workings of Aadhaar in India. Information Technology for Development, 27(1), 37–49. https://doi.org/10.1080/02681102.2020.1789037
Drèze, J., Khalid, N., Khera, R., & Somanchi, A. (2017, December 13). Aadhaar and Food Security in Jharkhand | Economic and Political Weekly. Retrieved May 13, 2024, from www.epw.in website: https://www.epw.in/journal/2017/50/special-articles/aadhaar-and-food-security-jharkhand.html
Ghani, E. (2020, March 18). Will decentralisation help India? The Financial Express. https://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/will-decentralisation-help-india/1901194/
Hundal, H. S., & Chaudhuri, B. (2020). Digital Identity and Exclusion in Welfare. Proceedings of the 2020 International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development. https://doi.org/10.1145/3392561.3397583
Krishna, S. (2020). Digital identity, datafication and social justice: understanding Aadhaar use among informal workers in south India. Information Technology for Development, 27(1), 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/02681102.2020.1818544
Madon, S., Ranjini, C. R., & Anantha Krishnan, R. K. (2022). Aadhaar and social assistance programming: local bureaucracies as critical intermediary. Information Technology for Development, 28(4), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/02681102.2021.2021130
Mir, U. B., Kar, A. K., Gupta, M. P., & Sharma, R. S. (2019). Prioritizing Digital Identity Goals – The Case Study of Aadhaar in India. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 11701, 489–501. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29374-1_40
Muralidharan, K., Niehaus, P., & Sukhtankar, S. (2020). Identity Verification Standards in Welfare Programs: Experimental Evidence from India. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w26744
Muralidharan, K., Niehaus, P., & Sukhtankar, S. (2021). Integrating Biometric Authentication in India’s Welfare Programs: Lessons from a Decade of Reforms §. Retrieved from https://www.ncaer.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/IPF2021Paper4.pdf
Sud, M., & VanSandt, C. V. (2014). Identity Rights: A Structural Void in Inclusive Growth. Journal of Business Ethics, 132(3), 589–601. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-014-2359-5
Srikavya Peri is an Analyst at Artha Global.
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