NADRA inaugurates online CNIC issuance, renewal facility

Interior Minister says step has been taken in order to provide relief to people

ISLAMABAD: National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) inaugurated on Monday a first of its kind facility that enables Pakistani citizens, in the country and abroad, to get their CNICs issued and renewed online.

Inaugurating the online system, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar said the step has been taken in order to provide relief to people who will no longer have to form long queues outside NADRA centres.

“With a single click, one will be able to renew their identity cards on the computer and get updates on the status of their application through the new online system,” he said.

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The new facility allows Pakistani citizens to apply online for the issuance or renewal of their CNICs and get it delivered to their doorstep within 10 days. Further, it allows citizens to pay the fee through a credit card or debit card.

Some of the salient features of the facility are as follows:

1) Application for new overseas CNIC (NICOP) for the first time

2) Reissuance of CNIC if lost, stolen, damaged or destroyed

3) Renewal of CNIC if it has expired

4) CNIC modification if national identity data needs to be amended

5) Application for converting CNIC to a chip-based Smart-ID card

DNA testing lab to be established

Further, Nisar announced that a DNA testing lab will also be established under NADRA which will work towards facilitating the armed forces of the country. “The DNA laboratory will start operating in the next six months,” he said.

The interior minister also announced that the government plans to set up 13 international level business centres in the next seven months, which will work as a one-stop place for the issuance of identity cards and passports.

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“The information of birth, death, marriage and divorce will be digitised and centralised to avoid issuance of fake documents,” he said. “We are going to centralise the entire data to curb corruption and to ensure online verification of identity cards.”

Providing statistics, the minister said some 64,000 passports were blocked last year, adding the institution has fetched government Rs5 billion.

He said the government is doing its utmost to ensure that not a single incompetent and corrupt officer works at NADRA. He also lauded the hard work of NADRA employees to end the backlog and to make the organisation a profitable institution.