icegov2012 proceedings

3.4 Driving License
Driving License database is also one of the large public databases
in Bangladesh owned by Bangladesh Road Transport Authority
(BRTA). Recently BRTA has undertaken a project titled
“Installation and Commissioning of High Security Driving
License System” and introduced Smart Card Driving licenses to
prevent the use of fake licenses. The license will have chips
storing a driver's biometric data e.g. photograph, fingerprints, and
signature among other details. The technology of the new license
will be similar to that of the MRP.
3.5 Tax Identification Number (TIN)
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has a database of more
than 2.6 million Tax Identification Number (TIN) holders. The
existing TIN is a manual registration program that suffers from
many defects including representation errors, duplicate numbers,
incomplete database and inconvenience of a decentralized
registration procedure [4]. It becomes difficult for the officials to
find out fake TIN holders while many people possess several
TINs. Now NBR is in the process of replacing this TIN by a
nationally unique number which will be linked to the national ID
Number to verify the identity of TIN holders.
3.6 Government Forms and Inconsistency
Each of the above systems owned by different agencies and they
have some common and very basic information regarding citizens.
A closer observation of the publicly used government forms
reflects that data inputs (like citizen’s name, parent’s name,
address, place of birth, date of birth, etc.) by different systems are
scarcely follows any specific standard. As a result, it is hard to
maintain integration and interoperability among these systems and
very often the systems produce inconsistent public documents as
outputs causing sufferings to the general mass people.
4. ADOPTING E-GIF IN BANGLADESH
The first formal interoperability initiative was circulated among
public agencies through a seminar titled “e-Governance
interoperability framework for Bangladesh” for e-Governance
focal points and ICT officials in the year 2008. Based on
participants’ recommendations all government offices have to use
Unicode-compliant NIKOSH font (Bengali language) in preparing
public documents. Other initiatives are depicted below:
4.1 Technical Interoperability Initiatives
In 2008, an eGIF team developed a comparative analytical report
on interoperability system among (i) Birth Registration
Information System (BRIS), (ii) project on Electoral Role with
Photograph (PRP) and (iii) database of Machine readable Passport
(MRP). The team proposed a Citizen Core Data Structure (CCDS)
to avoid duplication of work, enhance the sharing of information
and increase the authenticity of public services. In July 2011,
Cabinet Division finalized and released a CCDS Version 1.0 [1]
and confirmed that 11 (eleven) Mandatory fields must be filled
by the citizen while another 6 (six) optional fields may be
essential based on respective public agency requirements. The
mandatory fields are: citizen ID, Name (Bengali and English),
523
parent’s information (Bengali and English), date of birth, place of
birth, present address, permanent address, gender, marital status,
religion, profession and optional fields are: blood group,
nationality, Educational qualification, disability, biometric
information (digital picture, facial biometric, finger print, eye
iris). The metadata definition of the CDS elements contains field
level, field size and description which are believed to ensure
country-wide e-governance applications interoperability.
Furthermore, the Digital Certificate Interoperability Guideline [2]
represents the initiatives to perform a secure e-business and etransactions
with international standard.
4.2 Organizational Interoperability Initiatives
The National Identity Registration Authority (NIRA)’2008
mandated to provide 18 services to citizens e.g. passport issue,
opening bank account etc. It has introduced biometric Voter ID
cards which are definitely an initial step towards a future unified
national electronic ID system. Very recently, BEC has finalized a
policy to allow verification of information provided in the
national Identity (NID). The NBR and BEC have signed an
agreement to share data of the NID card holders and TIN holders
by cross checking which facilitates online verification of Identity
to prevent tax evasion and deception [4].
5. CONCLUSIONS/ RECOMMENDATIONS
All the documents regarding interoperability initiatives (e.g.
CCDS, policies, guidelines, acts, rules and regulations, etc.)
should be available in a central website where experts can easily
access to review and may contribute in government’s efforts while
developing an effective eGIF for the country. Simplification of all
government forms are essential in the way that common data
fields should be in the same format for all public information
systems. Government should have clear direction what document
will get the precedence (e.g. national ID or birth certificate) for
identity verification to avoid ambiguity.
6. REFERENCES
[1] Cabinet (2012). Citizen Core Data Structure (CCDS).
Cabinet Division, Government of Bangladesh. Accessed
from `http://www.cabinet.gov.bd/
[2] CCA (2012). Digital Certificate Interoperability Guideline.
Office of the Controller of Certifying Authorities (CCA),
Ministry of ICT. Accessed from www.cca.gov.bd/
[3] CTG (2012). Improving Government Interoperability,
http://www.ctg.albany.edu/publications/reports/improving_g
overnment_interoperability?chapter=1
[4] NBR (2012). Outline of Modernization Plan (2011-2016).
National Board of Revenue (NBR), Government of
Bangladesh. Accessed from: http://www.nbrbd.org/index.html
[5] Pardo, T.A. & Burke, G. B. (2008). Improving Government
Interoperability: a capability framework for government
managers, Center for Technology in Government, University
of Albany, New York.