The Election Commission (EC) has taken a plan to settle nearly 400,000 pending applications, submitted seeking correction in the national identity cards, within the next three months in a bid to curb the corruption in the NID services. Director General of the Election Commission’s National Identity Card (NID) Wing ASM Humayun Kabir on Thursday said this while talking to reporters following an operation of Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), conducted at the EC offices, targeting a network of corrupt staff and brokers who allegedly involved in bribery related to NID card services. Election Commission’s maiden meeting in progress “We’ll try to resolve 3.78 lakh pending applications submitted seeking corrections (in NID) within three months so that the opportunities for corruption are reduced,” he said. The ACC, in a crackdown started 11am on Thursday, detained two brokers red-handed and took action against two corrupt staff for their involvement in bribery related to EC’s national identity card services. The NID DG said the manpower crisis is a major reason behind the backlog of applications. So, an initiative has been taken to hire more manpower for the NID services, he said. Election Commission seeks opinions on electoral reform    “I hope you will see a crash program very soon. You will see significant improvement (in settlement of applications) in the next three months,” he said, adding that the EC would try to settle all 378,000 pending applications within this period. According to the EC’s statistics, there are more than 12 crore voters in the country. A large number of voters have various errors in their NIDs. But the people face harassment and difficulties in availing NID services.

Customers of mobile financial services provider (MFS) upay can now make payment of different service-related fees such as correction of national identity (NID) card and collection of duplicate NID. The service will be available to customers through the upay app and USSD code "268." Upay signed an agreement with the Election Commission (EC) Tuesday. Read: US-Bangla Airlines offers chance to youths to become pilot Rezaul Hossain, managing director and chief executive officer of upay, and Mohammad Azizul Islam, director of administration and finance at the NID wing under the EC Secretariat, signed the deal. Upay, a subsidiary of United Commercial Bank, launched its operation in March 2021. Since its launching, the company has acquired around 60 lakhs customers. It has more than one lakh agent points across the country, according to a media statement. Read Healthcare payments: Nagad offers discounts of up to Tk2,350.

A total of forty aspirants for the Awami League candidacy in the upcoming Dhaka-14, Sylhet-3 and Cumilla-5 by-elections collected the nomination papers in the first two days. Awami League sources told UNB that eleven, nine and twenty aspirants collected the papers for Dhaka-14, Sylhet-3 and Cumilla-5 respectively. The ruling party started the sale of nomination forms on Friday (June 4) and it will continue till June 10. Also read: Fifth phase municipality polls: AL nomination board sits Saturday Aspirants will be able to collect and submit their forms from 11am to 5pm from party president Sheikh Hasia's political office in Dhanmondi.

A Dhaka court on Thursday placed JKG Healthcare’s chairman Dr Sabrina Sharmin Hussain on two-day remand in a case filed over possessing two National Identity Cards or NIDs.

Bangladesh Railway has relaxed its previous directive that made National Identity Card (NID) mandatory for passengers while buying train tickets and travelling.