The Reserve Bank of India on Saturday clarified that linking of Aadhaar with bank accounts was mandatory.
The federal bank issued the clarification after a section of media quoted a reply to a Right to Information Act application that Aadhaar number linkage with bank accounts was not mandatory.
The statement said, “The Reserve Bank clarifies that, in applicable cases, linkage of Aadhaar number to bank account is mandatory under the Prevention of Money-laundering (Maintenance of Records) Second Amendment Rules, 2017 published in the Official Gazette on June 1, 2017.
“These Rules have statutory force and, as such, banks have to implement them without awaiting further instructions.”
The Aadhaar programme, which is the world’s largest biometric identity card programme, has triggered some claims that it is an infringement of privacy of citizens.
The Supreme Court in August had said that privacy was a fundamental right and the verdict was expected to complicate efforts of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to make linking of the ID card numbers with bank accounts, telephone numbers, etc.