The Unique Identification Authority of India has planned to increase biometric authentication capacity through Aadhaar to 40 crores a day from 10 crores to encourage more use of the platform for realizing a cashless society. The government is concurrently working on developing a common mobile phone app that can be used by shopkeepers and merchants for receiving Aadhaar-enabled payments bypassing credit and debit cards, pin and password. Through this mobile application, the handset will be used for authenticating biometrics of customers making Aadhaar enabled payment. UIDAI will eventually increase its biometric authentication capacity to 40 crores, UIDAI Chief Executive Officer Ajay Bhushan Pandey told reporters in New Delhi. He further said on Thursday, "We will create awareness about this mode of transactions. We will eventually create capacity for 40 crore authentications. Yesterday, 1.31 crore Aadhaar-enabled biometric authentications were reported. We will increase it gradually." He explained that these biometric authentications include attendance marked by employees of government establishments. The initiative can help the government deal with situations like recent demonetization and curb black money menace while bringing in more financial transaction transparency. The 12-digit number has already been issued to 1.08 crore people and 99 percent of adults have been covered. People can link their Aadhaar with their bank accounts and use Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AEPS) for funds transfer, balance inquiry, cash deposits or withdrawals and inter-banking transactions.