Exclusive: Crores of dead people live as Aadhaar ghosts; UIDAI looking for tech fix

An India Today RTI query revealed that about 1.17 crore Aadhaar cards of deceased persons were deactivated in the last 14 years, whereas more than 16 crore died in that period. A staggering gap that, UADAI says, it is trying to bridge with technology.

The gap has raised concerns about the misuse of active Aadhaar numbers long after an individual’s death.

An Right to Information (RTI) application filed by India Today TV has revealed that the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has deactivated just 1.15 crore Aadhaar numbers since the programme’s inception 14 years ago, a figure that falls dramatically short when compared to the country’s mortality rates.

As of June 2025, India has 142.39 crore Aadhaar holders. According to the United Nations Population Fund, the country’s total population stood at 146.39 crore in April 2025. In contrast, official data from the Civil Registration System (CRS) shows that India recorded an average of 83.5 lakh deaths every year between 2007 and 2019.

Despite this, UIDAI’s deactivation numbers remain staggeringly low — less than 10 per cent of total estimated deaths have led to Aadhaar numbers being cancelled. Officials admitted the process of deactivation is cumbersome and largely dependent on external data such as death certificates issued by state governments and updates from family members.

The UIDAI was set up in 2009 and issued its first Aadhaar number on September 29, 2010, to a resident of Nandurbar in Maharashtra. Yet, the authorities have no data on Aadhaar exclusions. When asked if it maintains any estimate of people who do not possess an Aadhaar, the UIDAI responded: “No such information is available”.

PROCESS DEPENDENT ON EXTERNAL DATA
The UIDAI confirmed that the process for deactivating a deceased person’s Aadhaar relies heavily on the Registrar General of India (RGI) sharing death records. “As and when RGI shares death records information along with Aadhaar numbers to UIDAI; UIDAI, after due process, deactivates the Aadhaar number of the deceased Aadhaar holders,” the authority said in its RTI response.

To address the gap, revised guidelines were issued in August 2023 through an official memorandum, detailing the mechanism for deactivation based on death records from the Civil Registration System.

Under these norms, death records are first matched against the Aadhaar database. For an Aadhaar number to be marked for deactivation, there must be a name match accuracy of at least 90 per cent and a 100 per cent gender match.

If both conditions are met, UIDAI performs final checks to ensure the Aadhaar number was not used for biometric authentication or any update after the recorded date of death. If no post-death activity is detected, the number is deactivated.

However, if there is any activity, further verification is done. If a deactivated Aadhaar number is later used for authentication, the system alerts the individual and asks them to visit an Aadhaar centre or UIDAI Regional Office for biometric verification to request reactivation.

Despite these steps, UIDAI does not track deactivations year-wise. Asked for annual data for the last five years, UIDAI said, “No such information is maintained year-wise. However, the total number of Aadhaar numbers deactivated on the basis of death report data received from RGI, since the inception of the Aadhaar programme till 31.12.2024, is 1,14,69,869”.

AADHAAR SATURATION ABOVE 100%

The mismatch between India’s death data and Aadhaar deactivations has wider implications, particularly highlighted by recent reports from Bihar during the Special Summary Revision (SSR) of electoral rolls.

In several districts of the Seemanchal region — Kishanganj (126 per cent), Katihar and Araria (123 per cent each), Purnia (121 per cent), and Sheikhpura (118 per cent) — Aadhaar saturation rates have crossed 100 per cent.

Aadhaar saturation reflects the percentage of a region’s projected population that holds Aadhaar numbers. A figure above 100% indicates possible data duplication, inaccuracies in population estimates, migration, or the failure to remove deceased individuals from the database.

The UIDAI’s RTI response even clarified why this happens: when Aadhaar numbers of the deceased are not promptly deactivated, they continue to inflate local saturation figures, sometimes resulting in more Aadhaar holders than actual residents.

UIDAI WORKING ON TECH SOLUTION
The central government acknowledged existing gaps in Aadhaar data and confirmed that UIDAI is developing technical solutions for automatic updates. One proposal under consideration is integrating Aadhaar data with that of the Registrar General of India (RGI) to enable seamless updates, Centre said in a statement on Wednesday.

In 2022, UIDAI formally requested the RGI to share death records linked with Aadhaar numbers. So far, about 1.55 crore death records from 24 States and Union Territories have been shared. After verification and data matching, approximately 1.17 crore Aadhaar numbers have been deactivated.

Source: https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/millions-dead-aadhaar-still-active-rti-finds-only-115-crore-cards-deactivated-2756437-2025-07-16