Picked up business sense at IIT-Bombay; helped build Infy; now, Nandan Nilekani brings the spirit of entrepreneurship to the business of governing
For Rohini Nilekani life seems to have come a full circle. Arghyam, her elegant house in suburban Bangalore has been turned into the unofficial headquarter of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI). Ever since her husband Nandan Nilekani gave up the co-chairman’s job at Infosys, the $4.6 billion (revenue, in 2008-09) company he co-founded with six colleagues in 1981, to take up a role in public service, there has been an endless stream of visitors at Arghyam. Although UIDAI’s official headquarter is in Delhi, the technical team is based in Bangalore. Nandan Nilekani splits his time between Delhi and Bangalore and just like in the early days of Infosys, where the founders often met at each others homes, lot of brainstorming on the project happens at the Nilekani household. “For 30 years Infosys consumed him and now it is UIDAI,” Rohini Nilekani says only half seriously.
In India, there is no single universally accepted identity number. Previous attempts by the government to create one have not worked. In 1993 the Government of India tried to issue photo identity cards by the Election Commission and then in 2003 it approved the Multipurpose National Identity Card. The inability to provide identity is one of the biggest barriers for the poor to access benefits and subsidies.
(This story appears in the 08 January, 2010 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)