NID: EC to prioritise JSC takers

The Election Commission will start collecting information from next year to issue national ID to those less than 18 years of age.

National Identity Registration Wing was looking to prioritise the ones who sat for their Junior School Certificate examination four years ago.

The move comes within a year after a bill was passed in Parliament, which said all citizens of Bangladesh must have National IDs.

It included the option of issuing IDs to those who cannot vote.

The EC now collects information for voters who are above 18. The voter list containing photographs is updated at the start of every year.

Recently, the commission told its registration wing to present a plan for issuing IDs to youngsters.

“We’ve thought of two proposals – one about collecting data for those above 15 and the other one is to gather information from those who sat for JSC in Eight grade,” Brig Gen Sultanuzzaman Md Saleh Uddin, the wing’s director general, told bdnews24.com.

The officials are also thinking of using information for those who participated in Primary School Certificate Exam in Fifth grade.

“We’ll most definitely start working on this from next year. We can start it while updating the list and in that way both work will be done. It will require lesser time in the future if we take information from those who passed JSC this time.”

The JSC and Junior Dakhil Certificate (JDC) tests were started in 2010. More than 300,000 sit for the tests every year when aged between 11 and 12.