Tag: Ease of Living

“Ease of Living” of Pensioners through Use of Face Authentication Technology for submission of Digital Life Certificates

 

A Milestone development to enhance “Ease of Living” of Pensioners through Use of Face Authentication Technology for submission of Digital Life Certificates

Posted On: 20 OCT 2022 2:54PM by PIB Delhi

With a view to enhance Ease of Living of pensioners, Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Portal (DoPPW), engaged with NIC, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (Meity) and UIDAI to develop a Face Authentication technology-based system based on UIDAI Aadhaar software for submission of digital life certificate by the Pensioners/Family Pensioners. As per this facility, the identity of a person will be established through Face Authentication technique and it is possible to submit Life Certificate from any Android based smart phone. Dr. Union Minister of State (IC) Ministry of Science and Technology; Minister of State (IC) Ministry of Earth Science; MoS of Prime Minister’s Office and Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions Dr Jitendra Singh launched this facility on 29.11.2021.

Submission of Digital Life Certificates through face authentication technique is a breakthrough technology which has reduced Pensioners’ dependence on external bio-metric devices and has made the process more accessible and affordable, thus ensuring ease of living for all the Pensioners/Family Pensioners. In addition, by using this digital mode for Life Certificate submission, pensioners can now submit their Life Certificates from the comfort of their homes.

The Department has also started a major campaign under Special Campaign for Disposal of Pending Matters (SCDPM 2.0) in which pensioners aged 80 years and above may submit their Life Certificates from 1st October every year to avoid the rush at banks. All Pensioners’ Associations across the country have been educated in the use of the Face Authentication Technology through online as well as physical trainings imparted by the department from time to time, in a phased manner, so as reach out to all Associations. The Pensioners’ Associations assist pensioners by visiting their homes and holding camps for enabling submission of Life Certificates using the Face Authentication Technology. Recently, Shri V Srinivas, Secretary (DoPPW) visited the office of the NF Railway pensioners’ Association at Guwahati on 14th October, 2022 as part of SCDPM 2.0 where he interacted with pensioners and large number of Digital Life Certificates were generated using Face Authentication Technology.

The department of Pension & Pensioners’ Welfare is making endeavors to enhance adoption of Face Authentication as best practices in digital innovation under SCDPM 2.0 to enable pensioners to use this technology at a larger scale. 

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25,000 compliances reduced by centre so far in its bid to promote Ease of Living and Ease of Doing Business

 The Minister of Commerce and Industry, Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution and Textiles, Shri Piyush Goyal today urged political leadership, bureaucracy and industry leadership to focus their initiatives to reduce compliance burden, on principles of simplicity and timely delivery of services.

He was addressing the valedictory session of the ‘National Workshop on the next phase of reforms to reduce Compliance Burden’ in New Delhi today. It may be noted that more than 25,000 compliances have been reduced in the previous exercise implemented by the centre to reduce compliance burden and to promote Ease of Living and Ease of Doing Business.

Touching upon the infinite possibilities of technology, Shri Goyal said that technology must aid and abet initiatives to promote the Ease of Living and Ease of doing business and should not further complicate the system of compliances. He spoke of the need to develop indigenous solutions to problems that India faced.

The Minister asked policy makers to consider the wide disparity in income, literacy level and the gaps in infrastructure, especially connectivity, while planning the delivery of services, especially if technology is involved.

Speaking of the need to make monitoring mechanisms more robust, Shri Goyal said that monitoring of policies and programs must not become more cumbersome than the underlying problem that the initiatives were seeking to solve.

Shri Goyal opined that feedback from all stakeholders, especially users, had to be taken into account while designing compliance requirements and that ground realities must always be taken into consideration. He urged policymakers to use crowdsourcing to find out details of the compliances that were proving to be cumbersome and work on rationalizing them.

He spoke of the need to combine various services like the Digi locker and National Single Window System so that repetitive processes are rationalized, gaps are bridged and redundancies are eliminated when it comes to applying for approvals and permissions. He called for the creation of a single identification number for businesses and individuals by merging the several identification numbers that exist presently, such as Adhaar, PAN, TAN etc so that delivery of services becomes smoother and faster.

Speaking of the need to decriminalize Legal Metrology, the Minister urged industry participants to keep seeking reforms and improvements in processes and procedures. He also called for promotion of self- attestation, self- certification and self- regulation. He added that it is high time that compliance systems were built on trusting the integrity of the citizens.  

Calling for big ticket reforms, the Minister said that the new structures must not shackle people. Underscoring the need to address information asymmetry among stakeholders, Shri Goyal called for, consolidation of the gains made so far in reducing compliance burden.

The day-long Workshop was divided into three parallel breakout sessions. The theme of the first was “Breaking Silos and Enhancing Synergies among Government Departments”. The second was based on the theme of “National Single Sign-on for Efficient Delivery of Citizen Services” while the third Breakout Session is themed ‘Effective Grievance Redressal’.

Speaking at the inauguration of the Workshop, Shri Anurag Jain, Secretary, Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) said that grievance redressal mechanisms must be humane and sensitive. He opined that in cases where grievances cannot be fully resolved due to rules and procedural aspects, the same must be conveyed to the complainant sensitively. Government departments could handle the genuine grievances with a human face, he added.

The Workshop witnessed wide participation from across Central Ministries and States/UTs. The ideas that took shape during the deliberations at the conference were presented to Shri Piyush Goyal and Cabinet Secretary, Shri Rajiv Gauba. 

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