'Instead Of Humans Trying To Authenticate, They May Delegate It To Agents': UIDAI Chief Neelkanth Mishra On Aadhaar's AI-Driven Future
· Free Press Journal
Speaking at a session on 'Digital Identity & Beyond' at the Global Fintech Fest in Mumbai, UIDAI Chairperson Neelkanth Mishra outlined how Aadhaar is preparing for a future shaped by AI agents, alongside Jupiter's Jitendra Gupta and moderator Srinivas Jain of SBI Funds Management. Mishra launched an SDK (Software Development Kit) so that face authentication can be embedded into many user apps. This will allow significant expansion of use cases and allow residents to use their Aadhaar in many, many more different use cases and perhaps, maybe a year later, even outside India.
Scale that keeps climbing
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Mishra revealed that Aadhaar authentications have surged to '10 crore authentications a day,' up from 7 crore when he first wrote UIDAI's annual report, adding that the system is 'preparing to be at 25 to 30 crore'. He said the Aadhaar app has also seen rapid adoption, nearing '6 crore downloads,' which he said is now driving a flywheel effect. "the moment you go to 5 crore and 6 crore," businesses "automatically start" wanting to embed Aadhaar into their own workflows.
'India Growth Story Inspires Global Trust': PM Narendra Modi Highlights 7.8% GDP Surge At Global Fintech Fest 2026Selective sharing and the agentic future
Discussing how Aadhaar is evolving beyond simple verification, Mishra explained that the app now enables selective data sharing rather than exposing a person's full details, comparing it to proving you're 'over 18' without handing over a photocopy of your entire card. Looking three years ahead, he said, "I think the agentic use cases will pick up a lot," predicting that "instead of humans trying to authenticate, they may delegate it to agents," and that new use cases will emerge that are "hard to imagine right now."
Jupiter's Gupta sees agents with narrow, defined powers
Gupta welcomed the direction, calling Aadhaar "one of the biggest boons for the fintech industry" for solving digital onboarding. He proposed marrying Aadhaar's purpose-driven data sharing with AI agents that carry narrowly scoped permissions. "This"This particular agent can use only age related authentic credentials," he said, giving the example of an agent authorised to "share only address and my photo, nothing else" while checking a user into a hotel. He predicted such an "agentic ecosystem" could eventually be offered as an API.
Security by design, not afterthought
Mishra also addressed the infrastructure challenges of scaling further, noting that UIDAI is implementing post-quantum cryptography to guard against future vulnerabilities and building "hyperscaler-like" capability in-house, given sovereignty concerns around using commercial hyperscalers. He said the long-term ambition is for Aadhaar to disappear from users' consciousness entirely: "we would like to become the infrastructure that no one knows... you shouldn't even be aware."