National ID
A reader, On e-mail
A Bengali daily published a very important report on the above subject. It appears that 22 facilities to be available have been tied up with the NID card. If it becomes a mandatory law for all Bangladeshi citizens at home and abroad, a number of anticipated hurdles would have to be faced both by the government and the citizens who are supposed to have and produce the NID card for those 22 facilities. These include some fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution to a citizen of Bangladesh. Therefore one would expect that the government is fully aware of the various pros and cons of the proposed ordinance which would require confirmation by the next parliament. It is also necessary to clearly define and delineate the functions of the issuing agency and the recipient of the NID card.The purpose of witting this letter is to request the media for a critical analysis from people's perspective of the benefits, bottlenecks and responsibility so that this is seen as a pro-people law. Here one can refer to the Special Powers Act, 1974 which is very controversial but yet to outlive its utility. In the backdrop of these opinions of mine, I would like to mention a few issues for the consideration of the government: a. This is going to be a very far reaching law affecting the life of 150 million Bangladeshis at home and abroad. The government would naturally get the draft law vetted by an independent institution like the Law Commission to avoid any contradiction between the proposed law and the constitution of Bangladesh. b. The volume of work in enormous. It would be necessary to draw a complete plan of work with necessary flexibility for adjustment as it goes alone. One would expect an ongoing and decentralized operation with multiple units doing the actual work, duly supervised, with monitoring and reporting by the central authority. c. At this moment the country is passing through a very critical transition period. The government is committed to minimizing corruption and its scope. Therefore, one wonders whether this kind of project might, I repeat might, open a new window for corruption due to a number of state facilities tagged to the NID card. Vigilance and a close watch on a possible negative fallout of the project will be required.
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