Cities are often portrayed as spaces of opportunity—jobs, services, and the promise of a better life. Nearly 30 years ago, Meenakshi’s parents came to Delhi with the same hope. When steady employment did not materialise, her father began working as a waste picker in North East Delhi. Life was never easy, but the family managed to survive. Today, however, they face a new crisis. With the introduction of SIR, their fragile existence has been pushed to the brink—there is not a single identity document in their household.
For millions of migrant and urban poor families like Meenakshi’s, the promise of the city remains unfulfilled. In India’s urban centres, the absence of identity documents—especially Aadhaar—has quietly become one of the biggest barriers to dignity, rights, and survival. What was introduced as a tool of inclusion has, in practice, turned into a gatekeeper. Without Aadhaar, access to healthcare, education, marriage registration, banking, employment, and even rehabilitation services is routinely denied.
A large section of the urban poor—migrant workers, domestic workers, daily wage earners, waste pickers, and slum residents—were born at home or in small private clinics without formal birth registration. Many have lived in cities like Delhi for 15 to 40 years, yet possess no documentary proof of birth. Nursing homes have shut down, discharge papers were lost or destroyed, and records no longer exist. As a result, thousands continue to live without any legal identity. Urban economies depend heavily on interstate migrant labour, yet these workers remain excluded from official systems. Frequent movement, informal housing, and the absence of rent agreements mean they cannot produce address proof, making Aadhaar enrolment or updates nearly impossible and locking them out of welfare schemes and essential services.
Even where documents exist, minor discrepancies often prove disastrous. Small mismatches in names, dates of birth, or parents’ details across ration cards, voter IDs, and school records regularly result in Aadhaar rejections or prolonged delays. These technical errors have serious consequences. Children are denied school admissions, students miss out on Direct Benefit Transfers, and families lose access to critical social security schemes. For households living hand to mouth, each rejection translates into lost wages, repeated visits to offices, and deepening vulnerability.
In urban India, Aadhaar is demanded almost everywhere, while alternatives are rarely accepted. Hospitals, schools, banks, mobile SIM providers, marriage registration offices, and employers routinely insist on Aadhaar. Government hospitals, including de-addiction centres, often refuse admission without Aadhaar or parental documents. Families with no documents at all are left with no option but private facilities charging between ₹5,000 and ₹15,000—amounts far beyond their reach. In these situations, parents are left helplessly watching their children slip toward death due to addiction, not because treatment does not exist, but because identity does.
This desperation has created fertile ground for exploitation. Middlemen and cyber cafés charge ₹300 to ₹1,000 for Aadhaar enrolment or corrections, preying on people’s lack of information. In several cases, individuals are handed fake or duplicate Aadhaar cards. When they later attempt to access services, OTPs fail and official portals reveal that no Aadhaar exists in their name. Instead of resolving exclusion, these fraudulent practices deepen mistrust and push families further into crisis.
Digitisation, promoted as a solution, has often worsened exclusion. Online appointments, OTP-based verification, and English-heavy forms systematically shut out elderly persons, women, persons with disabilities, and those with limited digital literacy. For the poorest households, the lack of smartphones, internet access, or familiarity with digital systems turns basic entitlements into distant privileges.
The impact of identity exclusion now extends beyond services into personal lives. There is a growing number of cases where marriages are broken because a woman does not have an Aadhaar card. In some instances, in-laws end marriages even after weddings; in others, families withdraw from finalised matches. With additional mandatory processes like SIR, the pressure, stigma, and social consequences have intensified, affecting lakhs of people across urban India.
Women and children bear the heaviest burden of this exclusion. Single, separated, or abandoned women often lack parental or spousal documents, making identity verification nearly impossible despite decades of residence in cities. Children without Aadhaar are denied school admissions, scholarships, and healthcare, pushing already vulnerable families into deeper cycles of poverty and intergenerational exclusion.
Urban inequality, however, is not just about lack of income—it is also about lack of recognition. The way forward lies in flexible and humane governance. Authorities must actively use alternative documents, self-declarations, community verification, and certifications by Gazetted Officers, as already permitted under existing rules. Welfare benefits must become truly portable across states, and regular outreach camps in slums and worksites should bridge documentation gaps. Frontline officials need sensitisation to understand migrant realities and apply rules with empathy rather than rigidity.
Cities run on the labour of migrants and the urban poor, yet deny them basic recognition. Aadhaar was meant to include, not exclude. Until identity systems are redesigned around people’s lived realities, India’s cities will continue to grow—while leaving millions unseen, unheard, and uncounted.
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