The National Database and Registration Authority has completed a large verification exercise to improve the accuracy of Pakistan’s national identity system.
Officials said the process involved matching records from the Civil Registration System with the National Citizen Database. During the verification, authorities discovered millions of identity cards linked to individuals who had already been registered as deceased.
As a result, around 4.2 million Computerized National Identity Cards were cancelled. These CNICs belonged to people whose deaths had already been recorded in civil registration records but whose identity cards were still active in the national database. NADRA officials explained that the cancellations were carried out in accordance with the NADRA Ordinance and the National Identity Card Rules.
Authorities said the issue occurred because many families had not informed NADRA after the deaths of their relatives. Although the deaths were registered with provincial civil authorities, the CNIC records remained active in the national database.
Officials revealed that about 42 lakh CNICs had remained active despite the deaths already being recorded. This created serious discrepancies in national population statistics.
Following NADRA’s awareness campaign and facilitation measures, the families of nearly 3 million deceased individuals have now contacted the authority to formally cancel their identity cards.
NADRA warned that failing to cancel the CNIC of a deceased person can create errors in population data. In some cases, identity cards may also be cancelled mistakenly or even due to malicious actions by relatives.
The authority advised citizens that if a CNIC is cancelled by mistake, they should immediately contact NADRA. They will be guided to obtain the relevant record from their Union Council and update the information to restore the correct status.
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Meanwhile, NADRA also highlighted another issue related to child registration. According to the authority, around 14 million children have been registered with Union Councils, but their records have not yet been entered into NADRA’s national database.
To address this issue, NADRA has started sending reminder SMS messages to parents and guardians. Parents have been urged to visit NADRA offices as soon as possible and obtain B-Forms, also known as Child Registration Certificates, so their children can be included in the national database.
