Daily Times

Last week, I had the pleasure of visiting the NADRA Executive Centre located in Liberty, Lahore. The purpose was to modify an identity card, seemingly a benign and simple enough task. The problem was that it was NADRA: the ‘National Agony and Dhakkay (push/shove) Rendering Authority’.

Virgie R Orpilla was born in the Philippines to Geno Veba and Pedro Orpilla, both devout Catholics. She got married to a chemical engineer at the age of 15 and had two children. Unfortunately, her husband’s untimely death forced her to work for her young children’s sustenance. A graduate in Food and Nutrition, Virgie Orpilla got a job in Saudi Arabia at the King Fahd Hospital. A driver of Pakistani descent, named Tahir Mahmood Qureshi, also worked at the hospital and was on her ‘pick and drop’ duty. Tahir proposed to Virgie and, upon her refusal, threatened to commit suicide. Eventually, Virgie agreed when he undertook to maintain her two young children.

Virgie and Tahir got married in the Philippines on August 10, 1992. Eleven days later they were married again in Lahore, after Virgie accepted Islam at the Badshahi mosque and was given the name ‘Yasmeen’. She was allowed by Tahir to go to the Philippines in 1993 on her mother’s death and the birth of her son. She was then forced to come back to Pakistan, made to surrender her Filipino passport and acquire Pakistani citizenship. Then she was left to live with her in-laws whilst her husband went back to Saudi Arabia, with 75,000 Saudi Riyals and 70 tolas of gold that belonged to her.

In June 2004, Tahir sent a divorce to Yasmeen from Saudi Arabia. She was held captive in Samanabad by her in-laws and was given liberty by the Lahore High Court in February 2005. Finally, after nearly 12 long years, Yasmeen was able to contact her two children, left behind in the Philippines, but her son in Pakistan had been taken away by her in-laws.

Last week, after enduring 19 years of misery at the hands of my fellow countrymen, Yasmeen was given the first bit of good news: her son in the Philippines is getting married on December 13 and wants her to come. So, armed with all her documents, Yasmeen, Farah (my associate) and I went to the NADRA office in Gulberg, opting to pay more for a speedy ‘executive’ CNIC. Since Yasmeen is now a part of my family, I feel personally responsible for ensuring that no further harm comes to her and she is able to see her children, after almost two decades, and take part in her son’s forthcoming wedding.

While at the office, I was functioning as a translator. Everything was going smoothly until we got to the part concerning the ‘birth country’. When the data entry officer, or rather ‘dhakkay ensuring officer’ (DEO) was told that it was the Philippines, he made around 20 attempts to enter it into the computer but ‘Pakpattan’ kept coming up as an option! He clicked on it but, upon my protest, deleted it and eventually clicked ‘nothing’! It was indeed news for Yasmeen that she was never born in this world! A classic ‘out-of-this-world’ example! Then we got to the part concerning the ‘father’s name’. Yasmeen said, “Pedro Orpilla”. Much to our horror, we were informed that her father was some guy called Muhammad Ilyas, and that all her life Yasmeen had wrongly assumed that she wahe daughter of Pedro Orpilla born in the Philippines, whereas she was the daughter of Muhammad Ilyas born in nothing!

Not to be daunted by this unforeseen turn of paternity and birth country, we showed the DEO the documents challenging NADRA’s version of Yasmeen’s life. To our exasperation, he told us that there was nothing he could do because his database showed that Muhammad Ilyas was Yasmeen’s father! Short of finding a filthy rich guy named Muhammed Ilyas and suing him for Yasmeen’s maintenance there was apparently nothing we could do. Irritated by my attempts at logic, the DEO totally stumped me when he asked whether or not we wanted the CNIC with Muhammad Ilyas as the father’s name! Upon our refusal, he was more than irritated at our irrationality of not wanting a ‘ready-made-NADRA-donated-Pakistani-father’! We were asked to get a court order if we wanted Mr Orpilla to be Yasmeen’s father.

Now, we have a divorce certificate, issued by NADRA, which clearly shows Pedro Orpilla as Yasmeen’s father. Her registered nikahnama also shows her real father’s name and so does her marriage contract and citizenship certificate. The point of having a central database is, or at least should be, to consolidate all the information with respect to a citizen. Getting poor, unsuspecting people to go to court to get an ‘order’ to change data seems preposterous in the presence of all the documents. The expense, time and hassle involved are needless and unwarranted.

The information in the data form issued is in Urdu whereas it should be available in English as well. However, what happens when the person is either illiterate or at a disadvantage like Yasmeen? Who should be held responsible for wrong entries in the data like the ones we were offered? Is this not criminal negligence?

I guess we could opt for Yasmeen, daughter of Muhammad Ilyas, born in Pakpattan or we could opt for ‘nothing’, but judging by the number of daily affectees of the ‘National Agony and Dhakkay Rendering Authority’, something or someone needs to be taken to task.

As I went through the NADRA laws, the ordinance, rules and regulations, I was amused by the lofty ideals put forth in the preamble. In the past 10 or so odd years since it came into force, problems still exist and it appears that its vision of centrally consolidating all data will remain a vision, as is apparent in Yasmeen’s case. Nothing is done to ease the plight of the hoards of people who visit NADRA centres daily and return home after waiting for hours in queues, yet to go back again the next day. Top this off with incorrect entries in the CNICs when finally issued and then the ‘citizen’ is back to square one! Though there is a provision for ‘executive’ cards, upon payment of a certain sum of money, it is apparent, like in every other sphere of life in Pakistan, that only the rich are able to avail this facility. As for the masses, it is still ‘agony’ and dhakkay all the way round — apparently our national sport these days.

The writer is an advocate of the High Court