India’s finance minister Shri Pranab Mukherjee has written to the chief ministers of 16 states to confirm that the Aadhaar platform is now ready to support payments under various schemes directly to the beneficiaries’ accounts in the selected areas.

He said that 50 districts have been selected in these states to pilot the project based on the number of Aadhaar enrolments, their mix of urban and rural population, the percentage of their population that is below the poverty line, per capita income, migration patterns, remittance corridors and the status of their eGovernance.

He added that the Ministry of Finance was seeking the full cooperation of the state governments to ensure the fast and efficient completion of the pilots. He said that these will handle the Public Distribution System, LPG distribution, paraffin disbursal, government pension schemes, the Janani Suraksha Yojana government aid scheme, government scholarships, financial inclusion programmes, Kisan Credit Cards (KCCs) and wage payments made under MGNREGS. 

Shri Mukherjee said that the results of the pilots would have a huge bearing on how the scheme was eventually rolled out in the country.