E-passport marks another step forward for Bangladesh, says Hasina

Bangladesh has taken another step forward in its path to digitisation with the launch of the electronic passport or e-passport, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has said.

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 22 Jan 2020, 09:44 AM
Updated : 22 Jan 2020, 09:44 AM

She made the remarks while inaugurating the  e-passport and automatic border control management system on Wednesday.

“Our initiative to issue e-passports marks another step forward for Bangladesh,” she said, noting that the e-passports will ensure smoother travels for Bangladeshi citizens.

“This is a biometric passport containing the photo, finger print and iris scan of the passport holder. Therefore, it will negate problems such as fake passports or impersonation. People won’t be cheated but will move with transparency.”

Bangladesh is the 119th country to introduce e-passports.

“It has already been initiated in 118 countries and Bangladesh is the 119th country. Bangladesh is the first in South Asia to introduce the e-passport,” said Sheikh Hasina.

“We adopt every new technology as we always want our country to move forward. We began to issue machine readable passports on Nov 24, 2015. We plan to issue e-passports for the 10 years starting from the 2018-19 fiscal year."

The delivery of e-passports will start in regional offices by the end of 2020. The services will expand in phases. Machine-readable passports will remain valid as well.

The Department of Immigration and Passports or DIP will initially distribute e-passports form its Agargaon, Uttara and Jatrabari offices in Dhaka, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan had previously said.

It will issue 48-page and 64-page e-passports with the validity of five years and ten years respectively.