Story
August 30, 2025
In One Indian State, Tech Companies Gain, Elders Lose in ‘Cradle to Grave’ Digital Governance
Country:
India’s government is using software tools to centralize power and cut back on welfare.
More than 1 million of Rajasthan, India's 9 million pensioners—seniors, disabled people, widows—stopped getting social security pensions of rupees 700-1,000/month ($7.95-$11.36 USD) as the state insisted on verifying them through the biometric ID Aadhaar.
Rajasthan is now set to switch to algorithmic artificial intelligence systems to deliver welfare. Digital records will be sorted with the help of complex algorithms, “machine learning” to determine who gets welfare and who doesn’t. Officials say they will use data to build “360-degree profiles” of residents, their families, and businesses.
In the previous system, many of those alive were declared “dead” or “out of state” after being unable to prove their presence digitally. Officials said that of those declared “dead,” 95% of the decisions were done through automated processes. These experiments took place for historically marginalized caste workers.
Pension activists ask: When errors leave so many without support for months, why is no one accountable?
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