In a move towards creating a cashless economy, the government has called for linkage of Aadhar numbers with all bank accounts for digital transaction. However, there is a still a long way to go for its actual implementation.

As the RBI has been pushing the banks to ensure that all the bank accounts are linked with the Aadhar number for various benefits of the account holders, questions are still being raised over the utility of such a move.

For, the government has been exhorting the citizens to give up their subsidies, monetary benefits, which they get from the government under various schemes for the sake of economically weaker sections, thus defeating the very purpose of asking the bank account holders to link their accounts with Aadhar. Mostly, so far, Aadhar is being used for disbursal of benefits, subsidies directly into the bank accounts of the beneficiaries.

As per data, till date, 49 crore bank accounts have been linked with Aadhar while 38.5 crore accounts are uniquely seeded meaning thereby one Aadhar number can be linked to more than one bank account in case of multiple account holders.

Sources say that there are about  100 crore bank accounts in all and so far only about 50 per cent have been linked with Aadhar.

While the government has so far not made it mandatory for the banks to link all the accounts with the respective Aadhar numbers of the account holders, there are some restrictions in the pipeline for those not willing to do so if insiders are to be believed.

A senior bank official with a public sector bank, on conditions of anonymity said, "There is pressure on the banks from the RBI to ensure maximum number of accounts are linked with UIDAI. Despite creating awareness through advertisements, publicity material, still there is a large chunk of bank accounts which are not linked with Aadhar for various reasons."

He further added, "As of now, RBI has not given any deadline to the banks to link all the accounts with Aadhar but there are talks going on regarding imposing restrictions on the bank accounts in near future which are not linked with Aadhar. These restrictions could range from limiting the number of free transactions to limiting certain other benefits for those accounts which are not linked with Aadhar".

Saurabh Yadav, an entrepreneur from Gurgaon, says, "What is the benefit for a middle class person in getting the bank account linked with Aadhar. If anything, I will be giving a free hand to the government to go through my bank account details once I link the two since I don't take any subsidy from the government and neither I am interested in taking it," he said.

Currently, the existing benefits for a common man of linking his bank account with Aadhar are limited. This include the Direct Benefits Transfer (DBTL) for LPG cylinder subsidy amount, subsidy for commodity products such as kerosene, sugar, rice, pulses and many other products, wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee, scholarships for students from the government, etc.

R K Gargr, an RTI activist, said, "As per the guidelines issued by the Apex court, Aadhar card is not mandatory for availing any government services. Still every bank keeps on insisting to link Aadhar with bank account. What is the purpose for it if not for snooping on bank accounts by the Finance Ministry".