Aadhaar Authentications Climbs To 2.31 Billion in March; Aadhaar-Enabled e-KYC Jumps 16%

Aadhaar holders have carried out nearly 2.31 billion authentication transactions in March 2023, indicative of the growing usage of Aadhaar and the growth of the digital economy in the country, the Ministry of Electronics & IT said in a statement on Wednesday.

“The March number is better than the February when 2.26 billion authentication transactions were carried out. While a majority of the authentications transaction numbers were carried out by using biometric fingerprint, it is followed by demographic and OTP authentications,” the ministry said.

It added that the Aadhaar e-KYC service continues to play a stellar role in banking and non-banking financial services by providing transparent and improved customer experience and helping in ease of doing business. More than 311.8 million eKYC transactions were carried out during March 2023, a jump of over 16.3 per cent against February.

The adoption of e-KYC has also significantly reduced customer acquisition costs of entities like financial institutions, telecom service providers, and others. The cumulative number of Aadhaar e-KYC transactions so far has gone past 14.7 billion by the end of March 2023. A total of 175 entities are live on the e-KYC.

“Aadhaar saturation among the adult population continues to be near universal. During the month of March, more than 21.47 million Aadhaars were updated following requests from the residents as against 16.8 million such updates in February 2023,” the ministry said.

It added that whether it is Aadhaar-enabled DBT for direct fund transfer, Aadhaar-enabled payment system (AePS) for last mile banking, authentications, or e-KYC for identity verification, Aadhaar, the digital infrastructure of good governance, has been playing an important role in supporting the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of Digital India, and enabling ease of living for residents.

The AePS is enabling financial inclusion for those at the bottom of the income pyramid. In March 2023, 219.3 million last-mile banking transactions were made possible through AePS and the network of micro ATMs.

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