The Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force on Sunday said it has arrested 10 people for preparing fake Aadhaar cards, PTI reported. The gang, including its kingpin Saurabh Singh, were arrested from Kanpur, an official said.

The Special Task Force also seized papers with fake fingerprints, and finger and retina scanners. The gang members used their own fingerprints and retina scans for the fake Aadhaar cards, the official told the news agency.

The police arrested them based on a complaint by a a Unique Identification Authority of India deputy director in Lucknow.

In August, the Bengaluru Police had arrested an IIT-Kharagpur graduate for hacking and illegally accessing Aadhaar data through the Unique Identification Authority of India server. The UIDAI had accused 31-year-old Abhinav Srivastav of accessing Aadhaar information in January 2017 through an app named Aadhaar e-KYC.

‘Zero tolerance’

In a statement released after the 10 people were arrested, UIDAI said it has zero tolerance towards “any errant activities by any rogue elements with regard to the standard processes and protocols” and that it is always vigilant and keeps auditing its system regularly for security purposes”.