National ID Card to be Gender Inclusive

July 25, 2017

Home Minister Janardan Sharma has informed the Parliament that the new national identity card will be gender inclusive and include the names of both the mother and grandmother of the bearer. He was responding to lawmakers Shanta Manavi and Kunti Shahi who had raised concerns about the possibility of missing the mother’s name on the card.

The national ID card, to be launched soon as a pilot project, will replace the present citizenship card. The prototype of the new card was approved by the Cabinet last month after consultations with all the stakeholders. During the pilot phase, the Home Ministry will issue 110,000 IDs through the National Identity Card Management Center.

The Home Minister also mentioned that the government would initiate action against perpetrators of violence against women and appealed to the Parliament to enforce stringent laws for combating the increasing inhumane crimes against them.