Sri Lanka redefines public lifestyle and the economy with a new HTM /NIC card

Sri Lanka is set to integrate the National Identity card (NIC) and the Household Transfer Management (HTM) card which will digitalise the whole platform from financial transaction to all data redefining the Sri Lankan lifestyle and the economy.

The HTM and NIC will be integrated into one physical card by June 30, 2018 confining the newly introduced E-NIC project to only one year as a short term stop gap.

This decision was taken at the Cabinet Committee on Economic Management (CCEM) to save US$2 million per day which is spent on social welfare such as pension and Samurdhi and enable more avenues to cater to many digital platforms of e-governance, digital education, e-health etc.

The new HTM- NIC card is to be issued to every person over 15 years of age, a senior official of the Telecommunications and Digital Infrastructure Ministry told the Business Times adding that it could be used as a national identity card and transaction card and also for transactions via mobile devices on 'tap and pay' system. It is a fully-integrated card, he said.

The Ministry recently called bids from local and international firms to award contracts, he said adding that 32 companies have submitted bids including Virtusa to become a hardware software and card partners.

The Department of Registration of Persons (DRP) has informed the CCEM that the current process of issuing NIC cards takes at least six months and the immediate requirement was 400,000 cards including NICs for GCE ordinary level students.

The DRP has been directed to proceed with the NIC project for one year for a maximum of 500,000 cards and switch to HTM-NIC project.

The DRP is the sole authority to register people and issue a national identity card. Since October 1971 it was engaged in issuing identity cards.

A Cabinet Paper, dated 27 July 2011, received approval to convert the conventional system into an e-NIC. A special unit to execute this was also established under the department and technical assistance was received from the University of Moratuwa.

The operations centre had been constructed in Battaramulla, along with the primary data centre, and the Secretariat for the identification of persons is nearing completion. To fulfill the operational requirement, 827 graduates were recruited and trained. But this E-NIC system is expected to continue till the end of next year.