Sri Lanka's India-assisted unique ID card project will begin by the end of January, a senior official said on Tuesday, as he mitigated concerns that data from the project would be restricted to the island nation only. The unique digital identity project, a crucial step in Sri Lanka's digitalisation programme, is being implemented with Indian grant assistance. Some SLR 20 billion are needed to implement this project, we aim to receive 50 per cent of that under the Indian assistance programme, Digital Economy Deputy Minister Eranga Weeraratna told reporters here. He said that the project will begin by the end of this month. The previous cabinet of President Ranil Wickremesinghe approved the India-funded unique identity card project. India advanced Rs 450 million for the implementation of the project in August 2023. The first phase of the project is to provide for the collection of biographic and biometric information including facial, iris and fingerprints, Weeraratna said. He also