Election Commission to hold workshop to untangle legal hurdles in NID corrections, 128,000 applications pending
The Election Commission (EC) has taken an initiative to hold a workshop to resolve the legal complexities in correcting information on National Identity Cards (NID) and reduce citizens' suffering. The information was learned from the EC's NID wing on Monday (2 November).
To that end, a total of 1,000 correction applications — 100 from each of the country's 10 administrative regions — will be reviewed. The workshop is planned for 19 November.
According to sources at the EC's National Identity Registration wing, in many cases a correction to NID information is needed on humanitarian grounds, but it cannot be approved because of the existing laws and rules. This kind of complexity is seen most in the NID corrections of expatriates.
If there is an error in one's own name or in a parent's name on the NID before going abroad, a mismatch later arises with passports and other documents. As a result, many expatriates run into trouble when making a new passport.
The matter has also been discussed in the national parliament. However, the existing law provides no scope to approve these applications on humanitarian grounds.
In this situation, opinions will be taken from teachers, social workers, public representatives, political party representatives, government officials and journalists to find a way to settle the complicated applications.
According to EC data, about 6,571,000 applications for NID correction have been submitted so far. Of them, about 6,443,000 have been settled. At present, about 128,000 applications remain pending.
Of these, about 70,000 applications are in the 'Gha' category. Those applications are settled by the director general of the NID wing. The remaining about 58,000 applications in the other categories are awaiting settlement at the field level.
Under the EC's Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), correction applications are settled by dividing them into six categories — Ka, Ka-1, Kha, Kha-1, Ga and Gha — according to the complexity of the application.
