Civil registration system needs a citizen-centred upgrade

Every year, lakhs of birth certificates are issued to establish the civil identity of citizens, and this document later becomes essential for obtaining a National ID (NID) card. Before the introduction of online birth registration, the process was entirely manual, slow, fragmented, and prone to errors. NID issuance began in 2008, and in 2010 Bangladesh modernised its civil registration system by launching the online Birth Registration Information System, reinforcing the legal requirement to register every birth within 45 days under the Birth and Death Registration Act, 2004.

Despite these advances, interoperability remains a major challenge. The Birth and Death Registration Information System (BDRIS) currently exchanges limited data with 22 government agencies through MoUs and API-based connections. Previously, in the absence of a unified legal mandate or a standardised data-protection framework, these arrangements relied more on administrative goodwill than enforceable safeguards. The recent introduction of the Personal Data Protection Ordinance (PDPO), Cyber Safety Ordinance (CSO), and the National Data Governance and Interoperability Architecture (NDGIA) provides much-needed regulatory clarity and institutional mechanisms for secure, transparent, and lawful data exchange. Together, these policy instruments signal the government's commitment to strengthening interoperability and establish a clear legal foundation for expanding future BDRIS linkages with other government systems.

However, the lack of full integration continues to create real-life complications for citizens. To obtain an NID, an individual must first have a birth certificate; yet an adult applying for a birth certificate is often required to present an NID as proof of age. For many, the experience resembles the classic question: which comes first, the egg or the chicken?

Even birth registration rate among children aged 0 and 11 months are not 100 percent in Bangladesh. However, major opportunity to link the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) with BDRIS exists. Such integration would allow birth registration to take place automatically at the point of delivery or during a child's first vaccination, ensuring accuracy and preventing children from being left out. Beyond easing the burden on families, this approach would reduce duplicated data entry across government offices and cut the number of steps citizens must navigate. Similar integrations are needed to bring birth and death registration closer to frontline health services, creating a more transparent, efficient, and citizen-friendly system.

The government's commitment to making BDRIS accessible to all is clear, but that commitment must now translate into more timely and forward-looking technical upgrades. The expansion of hosting capacity from 72-terabyte to 500 terabyte and the increase in document upload limits from 200-kilobyte to two-megabyte are welcome steps, but they come long after the system began straining under its own weight. These fixes should not be viewed as enhancements; they were overdue necessities for a platform expected to manage crores of records across the country.

Interoperability is also beginning to show promise. The April 2025 collaboration with the Election Commission, through which BDRIS data supported e-ID delivery for 1.25 crore students demonstrates what coordinated digital services can achieve when systems finally begin to talk to each other.

Despite these improvements, the current BDRIS interface still works only partially on mobile and tablet screens, even though smartphones remain the primary digital access point for many rural registrars and citizens. Without a fully responsive redesign, the platform risks excluding precisely the communities it aims to serve. A dedicated mobile app, designed around real user behaviour rather than technical assumptions, could simplify registration and deepen public engagement. Bangladesh does not lack talent; a national design challenge or hackathon involving universities and private-sector partners could inject fresh, practical ideas into the redesign process. Such an initiative would help BDRIS evolve into the intuitive, citizen-centred digital service it has the potential to be.

Improving BDRIS is not just a technical necessity; it is a matter of identity, access, and dignity. Civil registration platform responsible for documenting the very beginning of a person's legal existence cannot afford to be slow, disconnected, or difficult to navigate. It must be interoperable, easy to use, and designed around the realities of citizens' lives, not the limitations of legacy systems. Stronger coordination, user-centric design, and long-term planning are needed to close the remaining gaps. If these reforms are prioritised, BDRIS can truly fulfil the promise with which this journey began: ensuring that every individual is recognised, protected, and able to participate fully in public life.

GM Saiful Islam is a development professional specialising in local governance, urban planning, and results-based management.

Views expressed in this article are the author's own. 

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