Electronic ID cards for sectt staff, visitors soon

The government has decided to intensify the security of Bangladesh Secretariat, the hub of the country's administration, by introducing electronic identity cards (EICs) for employees and visitors.
Officials familiar with the initiative told BSS that work is underway to introduce the EICs for officials and other staff members of the complex, and electronic visitor cards (EVCs) for others.
"We will float a tender for the project as the preparatory work is nearing completion," an official said adding that the major objective of the task will be to check unauthorised entry into the Secretariat for ensuring security in the country's administrative heart.
He said the employees and the visitors would enter the offices by punching their respective cards to a readable machine while the number plates of listed vehicles of ministers and officials, which enter secretariat regularly, would be recorded in another device to be installed at the secretariat gates.
"The device will allow the recorded vehicles to enter the secretariat directly, but it would give warning alarm while any visitor's car passes through the gate," the official said.
The official said the plan was taken against the backdrop of growing security concern for the secretariat complex as it becomes unmanageable to scrutinise the entry of the growing number of visitors through the conventional way of the entry system.
"The introduction of the EIC and the EVC is expected to improve the security vigilance on the secretariat premises and keep the records of incoming and outgoing employees more transparently," another official said.
He said the new system would also discourage manipulation at the gate by the unwanted visitors to the secretariat.
The source also said the ministry has a plan to set up card readable machine in front of each ministry so that visitors would not enter any ministry with the pass of the other ministries.