Nepal gearing up to test Bio-metric Identity Cards by this year

KATHMANDU: Some one hundred thousand Nepalese will receive a national ID with personal data including biometric identity within the current fiscal year 2069-70 BS.

The ID also called smart card is being distributed with an objective of providing unique ID nos. for identity of each person by including details of each Nepali citizen in the national databank.

The government has expedited preparations with an objective of distributing electronic ID by the end of the FY from any one constituency of the country having internet services.

The government has presented the framework for distribution of ID with thumb print to 100,000 citizens as a pilot project with aid from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) at the Council of Ministers for approval.

The National ID Management Centre established two years ago as per the report presented by the National ID Management Task Force under the convenorship of the then Secretary Lilamani Paudyal, has collected more than 10.8 million statistics of people completing 16 years of age.

The Centre under the Home Ministry will distribute ID within the next five years in three phases, Centre’s Executive Director Narendra Dahal told RSS.
It will be distributed in 15 districts in the first phase, 25 in the second and 35 in the third phase after the pilot project, he said, adding its detailed project report has been presented to ADB.

“We have submitted the international bidding proposal to ADB for it,” he said, adding works are on to complete it by appointing international consultant as the ADB has selected 38 districts for Information and Communication Technology Development (ICD).

The centre will provide laptop for all districts and LAN has been installed and personal data processing centre has been set up.

Dahal also said full data, picture, thumb print, security traits, and biometric smart card chips will be included in the card with the co work with the Home Ministry, Ministry of General Administration, Land Reform, Transport and Nepal Telecom.

The distribution will be completed at a cost of 14 million US dollars, and ADB has committed cooperation as far as possible, said ADB Country Director Kenichi Yokoyama. He also said it will help in maintaining electronic good governance in the country.

After the distribution, the records of Nepalese and non- resident Nepalese and foreigners will be updated and criminal activities and forgery will be discouraged and it will help make elections clean as the name of a voter registered in one constituency will not be in any other constituencies. RSS