Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal thinks that shifting the National Identity (NID) card preparation work from the Election Commission to the Home Ministry was “appropriate.”
“Any controversy in this regard is totally undesirable. Taking opinion from all, we have placed the NID-related services under the Home Ministry. We have also taken advice from experts in this respect,” he told journalists after distributing the Bangabandhu scholarships among the children of jail inmates at the Department of Prisons on Wednesday.
At present, NID-related services are being provided under the EC, which has developed the NID database containing information about 10 crore citizens who are aged above 18.
The NID services include issuing secure national identity cards to citizens, administering all related activities, including maintaining a national citizen registration database and delivering identity verification services to qualified public and private organisations.
A full-fledged NID wing was established following the passage of the National Identity Registration Act 2010. Bangladesh launched NID cards with photographs in 2007-2008, as part of updating the voter list.
Meanwhile, at a seperate programme in the city on Wednesday, Chief Election Commissioner KM Nurul Huda said, “If the NID-related services are shifted from the Election Commission, it will be difficult to conduct elections.”
The CEC said decision to hand over the NID-related services to the government has not been finalised yet. “It’s not something like chair and table that we can move it [from one place to another place]. We need to hold talks on this issue.”
He said that the NID services were created for the sake of voting only.
