Santosh Jena, an employee working with Odisha’s electrical department has threatened to commit suicide after he was unable to withdraw his Employee Provident Fund (EPF) due to an error on his Aadhaar Card.
As Jena’s date of birth on his Aadhaar Card is different from the one mentioned on his birth certificate, he was unable to withdraw his EPF. Therefore, he threatened to commit suicide.
He said, “My salary here is very low. At present I am incapable of getting my daughter married and fund my son’s education, which is why I wanted to withdraw my EPF. But due to wrong entry in the Aadhaar Card, I am unable to withdraw the deposited amount from my account.”
“My family is suffering from the past one year because of lack of money. I now want to appeal to the government as well as the district administration of Mayurbhanj to help me, otherwise, I will be forced to commit suicide,” he added.
Jena also claimed of approaching several government officers to get the correction done on his Aadhaar Card, but no efforts were taken by any department to help him.
Meanwhile, Satyabrata Mohanty told ANI, “Not only in rural areas of the state but also in urban, lakhs of people still don’t have an Aadhaar Card with correct details. Thousands of them till today do not possess Aadhaar Card. It is sad, that government is still forcing people to show Aadhaar Card for obtaining their own money.”
However, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) does have a provision for the change in the date of birth and other details.
The notification in the Aadhaar (Enrolment and Update) Regulations, 2016 states, “In case the date of birth is to be updated more than once, it can only be done through an exception handling process which may require the resident to visit the Regional Office (RO) of the UIDAI.”
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