Overview
Indian Railways is one the largest employers in the country. With the growing use of Aadhar in most of the public sector services, the Indian Railways now has also decided to make it mandatory for online applications for employment. The potential aspirants who would like to get a job with the Indian Railways now need to furnish their 12-digit Aadhar number. The Railway Recruitment Boards (RRBs) have decided that for all future recruitments, the applicants need to provide their Aadhaar number during the online application. If the Aadhaar is not available, then the applicants can provide their 28-digit Aadhar registration receipt for filling the applications.
For those applicants who do not have an Aadhar and wish to apply for RRB recruitment, the RRB has made it clear for them to get themselves enrolled with UIDAI and get an Aadhar card. Having a valid 12-digit Aadhaar number is the only way going forward for applying to the recruitment of the Indian Railways.
Why This Move
The move has largely been prompted to ensure fair examinations. The RRBs have declared that there will be biometric devices made available at the examination centers. The fingerprints of all the examines will be collected at the examination centers to validate them with their Aadhar. There have been various instances of impersonation and others taking the examinations on behalf of the genuine candidates. The fingerprints scanned at the examination centers will be verified with the fingerprint of the candidates stored in the UIDAI servers. This is a fool-proof mechanism and will leave no doubt for the credentials of the candidate appearing in the examination.
The RRBs also announced that this move will make the verification of the candidates much more convenient and hassle-free. This process comes under the Aadhar Act which came into effect from 14th September 2016. The RRBs said that under the section 57 of the Aadhar Act, the Aadhaar number can be used to establish the identity of any individual for any purpose pursuant to any law or any contract to this effect.
Exceptions
It is important to note that the residents of three states- Jammu and Kashmir, Assam and Meghalaya- have been exempted from this rule. Applicants from these three states will be required to furnish their Passport number, Voter- ID card number or details of any other valid government approved identity card. The applicants from all the other states though need to compulsorily fill their Aadhar number while filling the online RRB application form.
Conclusion
The move comes in to strengthen the examination process and ensure that the examinations are conducted in a fair and transparent manner. The identity of the candidates will be verified without any error and this will eliminate any chances of impersonation and writing of examinations by anyone else other than the genuine applicant. It will make the entire process of candidate identity verification smoother and fool-proof and thus is a welcome step. The candidates who do not have an Aadhar number should enroll themselves with the UIDAI immediately and get their 12-digit Aadhar number for applying to recruitment examinations of the Indian Railways.