IAS officer Saurabh Vijay was appointed to the post of CEO of UIDAI

Senior IAS officer Mr. Saurabh Vijay has officially assumed charge as the new Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).

He is a 1998 batch officer of the Maharashtra cadre and has long administrative experience working in both the state and central governments.

Mr. Saurabh Vijay assumed charge as the new CEO of UIDAI on May 18, 2026. He will handle the responsibility of one of India’s most important digital governance leadership positions.

UIDAI manages Aadhaar, which is the world’s largest biometric identity program.

Saurabh Vijay is a senior Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the 1998 batch of the Maharashtra cadre. He has built a long administrative career while working in many different departments.

His appointment came after former UIDAI CEO Bhuvnesh Kumar was made Secretary of the Tourism Department. After Kumar, UIDAI Deputy Director General Vivek Chandra Verma was given additional charge of CEO of UIDAI on April 23.

Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI)

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is a statutory authority established by the Government of India on July 12, 2016 under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), under the provisions of the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 (Aadhaar Act, 2016).

The Aadhaar Act, 2016 has been amended by the Aadhaar and Other Laws (Amendment) Act, 2019.

Before its establishment as a statutory authority, UIDAI was functioning as an attached office of the erstwhile Planning Commission (now NITI Aayog).

On September 12, 2015, the government amended the 'Allocation of Business Rules', under which UIDAI was attached with the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY).

UIDAI headquarters is located in New Delhi and it functions through its eight regional offices located in Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Lucknow, Mumbai, New Delhi and Ranchi.

UIDAI has two data centers – one in Hebbal (Bengaluru), Karnataka and the other in Manesar (Gurugram), Haryana.

UIDAI consists of one Chairperson, two part-time members and one Chief Executive Officer (CEO); the CEO also acts as the Member-Secretary of this authority.

The first UID number was issued on September 29, 2010 to a resident living in Nandurbar, Maharashtra.