EC to issue voter cards if lose NID authority

The Election Commission, also known as EC, will issue voter cards if the government transfers the authority of national identification services from the commission to the home ministry, as proposed, Election Commissioner Md Alamgir has said. 

"We will have no loss if NID authority is taken away from us. In the case of elections, we work with voter lists. The voter lists and the NIDs are different," he said while talking to the reporters at his office in the capital on Thursday. 

"The server that preserves data related to voters will be in our hands. Here is no way to transfer its authority."

On EVMs use, the election commissioner said they will use the existing EVMs if new ones cannot be bought.

"The purchase depends on the Planning Commission. There are many issues. If the Planning Commission thinks the country is financially okay to afford the expenditure for new EVMs, we will have new ones. Otherwise, we will not."

However, if the project doesn't pass within January next, the commission will fail to make arrangements for large-scale EVM use, he added.

Election Commissioner Alamgir also said the probe body investigating the irregularities in the Gaibandha by-election will return to Dhaka on Friday and submit the report soon. "We will take the next steps depending on the report."

On allegations of installing CCTV cameras in the secret polling rooms during that election, the commissioner said they did not do that. "No authorities have the right to know who voted for whom. So, we did not keep such opportunities."