About half of the country's total population will get their Unique Identification cards within the next five and half years, Chairman of Unique Identifaction Authority of India (UIDAI), Nandan Nilekani said on Tuesday.

The number of the people who would get the cards would be over 600 million, Nilekani told reporteers. Later the co-founder of IT giant INFOSYS held a meeting with the Chief Minister, Nitish Kumar and said in Bihar the work would start in between August and December 2010.

Kumar urged Nilekani to ensure preparations of the cards in the state at the time of festivals like Chhath, Holi, Diwali and Eid to ensure coverage of more people as the migrants used to return home during the time. Kumar informed Nilekani that the E-shakti scheme would be introduced in other parts of the state. It would help in weeding out corruption in implementing NREGA.