For Covid-19 vaccine Aadhaar is mandatory even if registration on CoWin done with other ID. Sort of

Have you booked your COVID-19 vaccination slot using your PAN Card? Chances are you will have to wait longer or might not get the vaccine at all because the Aadhaar Card has been mandatory for vaccine registration. Several users were turned down by vaccination centres for not possessing an Aadhaar Card whereas they had other government-approved ID cards and registered on CoWin website using those cards. While no official announcement was made about the same, the Aadhar Card has now become mandatory for COVID-19 vaccine registration.

A Twitter user named Radhika Radhakrishnan had reported that she was asked by a vaccination centre in Bengaluru to wait longer to get vaccinated without the Aadhaar card. The user said that she had already waited for hours to get the vaccine. Radhika has also shared a picture of the note written on a whiteboard at the Columbia Asia Banglaore that says “Aadhaar is mandatory”.

Columbia Asia Bangalore has made Aadhaar compulsory for the COVID-19 vaccine. When I told them I've registered on cowin using PAN card and they can't legally mandate Aadhaar, they said I'll have to wait longer if I want to be vaccinated without Aadhaar, after having waited hours,” she said.

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However, Radhika narrated that when she refused to give her Aadhaar card at the hospital, the staff showed her the CoWin website which had now made entering Aadhaar details mandatory.

When I refused to give my Aadhaar card at the hospital for the vaccine, the vaccine officer showed me the cowin portal on their system. Aadhaar card seems to have been made a system-level requirement, as you can see here. She could not generate my vaccine certificate without it, she tweeted.”

Radhika also mentioned that she had registered on the CoWin platform using her pan card. Her name on the pan card was Radhika R but on Aadhaar her name was written, Radhika Radhakrishnan. Since the name did not match in the two cards, the staff had to re-register her on Cowin using a different phone number. Apparently, Radhika is not the only one, several users were asked to delete their registration and do a fresh registration using the Aadhaar card.

Till some time ago, the CoWin platform allowed users to book a vaccination slot using any of the government-approved identity cards like the driving license, voters ID card and pan card. On presenting any of the above mentioned IDs, users could get their jabs easily, but now things have changed. Now, if you want to book a slot, you will have to register using the Aadhaar card and carry it with you to the vaccination centre.