Smart identity cards for all challenged people

All the challenged people will get smart identity cards by the end of next year.

A survey of the Department of Social Services has identified 15.1 lakh challenged people across the country. The department is also developing a database of those people.

Talking to BSS, secretary in charge M Zillur Rahman of the social welfare ministry said the government has planned to distribute smart cards among the challenged people on the basis of the database information.

If the smart cards cannot be distributed within the stipulated time, it must be completed by the first quarter of 2018, he added.

The secretary in charge said the social welfare department has started working on provisional identity cards for the challenged people.

The database is likely to be ready by May next year. Once the database is developed, the government will conduct a research on the information of the database to identify the reasons for disabilities and ways to prevent those, he noted.

Zillur said the ministry will try to ensure all possible facilities, including government job, for the challenged people.

About the facilities, he said the government was giving therapeutic services, training and counselling to about 10,000 challenged people daily through 103 service centres under Jatiya Protibondhi Unnayan Foundation.

Besides, there are 10 free schools for autistic children under the foundation. Thirty-two mobile therapy vans are providing early screening, assessment and intervention services across the country.

The foundation was set up in 1999 during the then government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, the secretary in charge said.

The government distributed allowances amounting to Tk 540 crore among 7.5 lakh insolvent challenged people this year, Zillur told the BSS.

According to the official, the government also gave stipends worth Tk 50 crore to 70,000 challenged students.