Parliamentary body urges resolving e-passport problems

A parliamentary body at a Sunday meeting recommended easing processes concerning migrant workers, and identifying and resolving all e-passport related problems as soon as possible.   

The parliamentary standing committee on the expatriate welfare ministry at its 16th meeting also suggested taking measures to introduce an experimental insurance system for migrant workers coming back within one year.

Committee Chairman Anisul Islam Mahmud chaired the meeting at the Parliament Building.     

The government has introduced hi-tech e-passports, having both benefits and disadvantages, replacing the machine readable passport (MRP).  

The e-passport is given based on the information on the national identity card (NID). But no applicant will get an e-passport if there is any mismatch between the NID and MRP information.

Sources close to the process said there are common silly mistakes in most of the NIDs and people are not getting e-passports due to these errors.

There is a huge number of e-passports held up by passport offices across the country which has created problems for many travelers and migrant workers.   

The parliamentary body in its meeting discussed the activities of the immigration and passport department to make their services fast and urgent for a disciplined, safe, regular, and responsible processing of migrant workers going abroad. 

The committee also suggested holding regular discussions with the Bangladesh Biman to reduce the air fare for outgoing migrant workers.