Some newspapers have reported today that the use of Aadhaar Card will be a “must” to avail benefits under the Ayushman Bharat – National Health Protection Mission.

This is factually incorrect.

Notification of the Ayushman Bharat – National Health Protection Mission being issued by MoHFW under Section 7 of the Aadhaar Act, merely enables the implementation agencies to ask for the beneficiary Aadhaar Card to authenticate their identity. In order to authenticate the identity of beneficiaries accurately, the use of Aadhaar card is preferable, but it is not a “must”. There shall be no denial of benefit for want of Aadhaar number.

The Minister Sh JP Health Nadda confirmed that “we will provide services all eligible beneficiaries with or without Aadhar cards.”

The draft notification also provides for exception handling mechanism, viz production of alternate identification mechanisms such as Ration Card, Voter ID Card, MGNREGA Card etc. (as mentioned in the notification) in case the beneficiary does not have an Aadhaar No. Furthermore, it also makes the implementation agencies accountable for setting up of Aadhaar enrollment centers for the beneficiaries who are not yet enrolled for Aadhaar, at convenient locations.

ABNHPM guidelines on beneficiary identification very clearly state that beneficiaries can bring Aadhar or any other valid government id(s) decided by the State if they do not have an Aadhaar. (https://www.abnhpm.gov.in/sites/default/files/2018-06/GuidelinesonProcessofBeneficiaryIdentification_0.pdf)