Youth to get UID through youth affairs ministry

Indian youth can now get the unique identification (UID) number with the help of youth and sports affairs ministry. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Jan 27, 2011, 21:00:02 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

Indian youth can now get the unique identification (UID) number with the help of youth and sports affairs ministry.

Ajay Maken, the minister in-charge, has decided to provide UID to 20,000 youth enrolled with National Youth Corps, in the first go. Thereafter, the young Indians with the Nehru Yuva Kendras, having about youth clubs around the country, would get UIDs.

“I have asked the officials to speak with the UID Authority of India in this regard,” Maken said. Under the UID scheme, every Indian resident will get a unique number based on biometric identification in the next three to five years.

Enrolling those in youth corps has a twin purpose. First to track whether they are actually getting Rs 2,500 every month under the national youth scheme. Second, is to find out whether they got employed with the help of skill training under the programme.

Maken said through the UID the ministry can have a large database of youth in India for whom existing programmes will be reformed.

One such initiative has been taken for youth in the north-eastern India following a suggestion from Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi. “I have called a meeting of all youth affairs ministers from north-east to discuss how skills of youth there can be upgraded with the help of industry body FICCI,” Maken said.

The announcement comes at the time when one of the biggest states in the region, Assam, is going to polls. The move is being seen as a last ditch effort to woo youngsters, who have been launched a campaign against the government for over-exploitation of natural resources in the region.

Already, Right To Information activist Akhil Gagoi has launched a people’s movement against the state government for allowing a large number of dams on river Brahmaputra. The government thinks that such sort of activities can be checked if youth are given skill training for employment purpose.

Maken said if the youth are given skill training to help them in getting livelihood the problem of insurgency in the region could also be checked. The ministry has identified naxal affected areas and Jammu and Kashmir for starting similar programmes.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Catch every big hit, every wicket with Crickit, a one stop destination for Live Scores, Match Stats, Infographics & much more. Explore now!

Stay updated with all top Cities including, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and more across India. Stay informed on the latest happenings in World News along with Delhi Election 2025 and Delhi Election Result 2025 Live, New Delhi Election Result Live, Kalkaji Election Result Live at Hindustan Times.