Telcos told to give Aadhaar-exit plan by Oct 15
New Delhi, Oct 1 : The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) on Monday asked telecom operators to submit a plan to stop the use of Aadhaar for authentication of subscribers.
The Supreme Court last week, while upholding the constitutional validity of the Aadhaar Act, disallowed private entities from possessing the Aadhaar details of customers.
In a letter to the telecom companies, UIDAI said: "TSPs (telecom service providers) are hereby directed to submit by l5th October an action plan/exit plan to the Authority for closure of use of Aadhaar based authentication systems.
"If the Authority does not receive any communication to this effect within the stipulated timeline, the authentication services shall be terminated without any further notice."
The letter accessed by IANS also asked the operators to delink Aadhaar from mobile numbers when sought by any subscriber and perform KYC (Know Your Customer) procedures afresh using the list of documents approved by the Department of Telecom (DoT).
"All TSPSs shall immediately notify their customers the facility of delinking their Aadhaar number and UID Token from their database and establish a system to accept and process such requests for delinking," it said.
Commenting on the development, Cellular Operators' Authority of India Director General Rajan Mathews said the industry body would talk to the DoT soon to discuss the modalities.
"Once we determine what the order means, then we will obviously work with the DoT, whether the timeframe is feasible or not," he said.
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NATO, others turn down US call for help in Hormuz: Trump
Washington (PTI): President Donald Trump on Tuesday said NATO and most of US' other allies have rejected his calls to help secure the Strait of Hormuz as the war with Iran entered the third week.
In a social media post, Trump asserted that Iran’s military has been “decimated” and he no longer felt the need for assistance from NATO countries or anyone else.
Last week, Trump had sought help from European nations and others who depend on oil supplies transiting from the Hormuz Strait to safeguard the critical waterway.
“The United States has been informed by most of our NATO “Allies” that they don’t want to get involved with our Military Operation against the Terrorist Regime of Iran, in the Middle East, this, despite the fact that almost every Country strongly agreed with what we are doing, and that Iran cannot, in any way, shape, or form, be allowed to have a Nuclear Weapon,” the US President said in a post on Truth Social.
Iran's attacks on Gulf nations and its grip on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's oil is transported, have sparked increasing concerns of a global energy crisis and are unnerving the world economy.
“I am not surprised by their action, however, because I always considered NATO, where we spend Hundreds of Billions of Dollars per year protecting these same Countries, to be a one-way street — We will protect them, but they will do nothing for us, in particular, in a time of need,” Trump said.
He said Australia, Japan and South Korea too have turned down his call for help.
“Fortunately, we have decimated Iran’s Military – Their Navy is gone, their Air Force is gone, their Anti-Aircraft and Radar is gone and perhaps, most importantly, their Leaders, at virtually every level, are gone, never to threaten us, our Middle Eastern Allies, or the World, again,” Trump said.
He said that given the scale of recent military successes, the US no longer "need" or desires assistance from NATO countries, adding that it never relied on such support in the first place.
Speaking as President of the United States, the "most powerful" country in the world, "we do not need" help from anyone, Trump said.
The West Asia conflict began on February 28 when the US-Israeli combine conducted airstrikes on Iran.
The Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway that connects the Persian Gulf to the open ocean, has effectively been shut following the US and Israel attack on Iran and Tehran's sweeping retaliation.
However, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi had said that from Tehran's "perspective", the strait is "open". "It is only closed to Iran's enemies, to those who carried out unjust aggression against our country and to their allies.”
Earlier in the day, a second Indian-flagged LPG tanker, Nanda Devi, reached the country after safely sailing from the war-hit Strait of Hormuz. On Monday, the first ship, Shivalik, reached Mundra port in Gujarat.
As of now, 22 Indian vessels remain on the west side and two on the east side of the strait.
Indian authorities are in constant touch with all the relevant stakeholders in the region to secure the safe passage of the remaining ships, officials said.
