A Unique Bar Code for Every Indian – An Idea of 1999

Most of us are familiar with Barcodes. A barcode is an optical, machine-readable, representation of data; the data usually describes something about the object that carries the barcode. There are two standards for barcodes – EAN (European Article Number) and UPC (Universal Product Code).

A meeting was held at International Management Institute, Qutab Institutional Area, New Delhi on 24 February 1999 at the initiative of Mr. Ravi Mathur, CEO, EAN India which I had the opportunity to attend along with my colleague Dr Pradip K Bhaumik.

As a Not-for-Profit initiative of the Ministry of Commerce, Government of India, EAN-India had the mandate to represent EAN-International in India and to popularise the use of bar codes and EDI in India Business processes. This meeting led us to conduct a small consulting assignment for EAN India titled "Supply Chains for Pharmaceuticals and Healthcare Products" which was completed in October 1999.

During the meeting, I came up with the IDEA OF ASSIGNING A UNIQUE IDENTIFICATION BAR CODE TO EVERY INDIAN which would help the government in increasing the efficiency of supply chains related to public distribution system tremendously.

Mr. Mathur reacted by telling me that both EAN and UPC were morally and ethically against bar-coding human beings. EAN and UPC were willing to provide unique codes to all physical things, animate or inanimate, EXCEPT human beings. Things are changing now. US is debating "Human Bar Coding" (http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/543137/bar-code-for-humans)

Just a coincidence that Mr. Nandan Nilekani published "Imagining India: Ideas for the New Century" in 2008 and was invited to set up The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) in 2009. Isn't AADHAR the same thing?

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