How a glitch in India's biometric welfare system can be lethal

Claimants are given a 12-digit number linked to their data, and if something goes wrong they can be refused food

Motka Manjhi had been back and forth to the ration shop four or five times, his wife said, but on each occasion he returned empty-handed. His thumbprint, needed to prove his identity, wasn't registering on the new system.

He was told to do an online update. But to do so he would need to get to a private centre - a four-mile journey from his village in Dumka, in the state of Jharkhand, north-east India. This would mean missing at least a day's potential work, which he desperately needed to buy food. And even if he made the trek, there was no guarantee that the system, which often suffers from network outages, would be working properly. What was to be done?