July 01, 2008	Tuesday	Jamadi-us-Sani 26, 1429

KARACHI, June 30: Investigations into a recent robbery attempt at a Delhi Colony bank, in which a policeman and a robber were killed in the ensuing shoot-out and the criminal’s fleeing accomplices were caught on tape by closed-circuit cameras, have brought baffling facts to the fore for law enforcers, who have found dual registration of one of the suspects with the National Database Registration Authority (Nadra), with two identity cards separately issued from Lahore and Karachi.

The discovery has not only brought the police investigations almost to a halt, it has put a question mark over the accuracy, functioning and authenticity of the system regulated by Nadra.

“The investigation team actually approached the Nadra authorities for the identity details of the four suspects after they were identified through the footage recorded by the closed-circuit cameras of the robbed bank branch,” said an official, who is part of the investigation team.

“But later, when the suspects’ details were sought, the police came to know that one of them had two CNICs (computerized national identity cards) each from Karachi and Lahore.”

He said both the CNICs were valid, which further complicated the investigations.

“The police definitely have been looking for the suspect and mobilizing all due efforts for his arrest, but such a loophole in the system is a serious problem for the law enforcement agencies, which depend on the authority’s data while investigating such cases,” added the official.

A police constable and a bandit were killed in the encounter as police foiled the robbery attempt at a private bank in Delhi Colony on June 19. Witnesses said about four persons entered the branch of Bank Al Habib at around 9.16am and held the staff and customers at gunpoint.

They deprived the two guards of a private security agency deputed at the bank of their guns and collected over Rs5.1 million before encountering a police party, which was waiting outside the branch.

During the shoot-out, police constable Abrar Husain and alleged robber Javed Akhtar were killed. His accomplices ran away, unaware of the fact that they had been caught on the closed-circuit cameras installed in and outside the bank branch.

“After establishing their identities, the police went to Nadra to get their personal data,” said the official. “However, we found one of the suspects, Khalid Saeed, having dual identities registered by the authority with residential addresses, one each from Walton Road in Lahore and Model Colony in Karachi.”

Striking similarities

Elaborating, he said so far details of the investigations showed that the date of birth, father’s name and identification mark were the same on both the CNICs, but they showed different residential addresses with different family, card numbers and photographs.

“We are unable to understand how one can breach such a high-tech system,” he said. “We have heard that our system also operates on an auto-hunt basis, which disallows a person from registering twice with different identities. But in this case we have seen the thumb impression of the same person on each CNIC and he still managed to dodge the system.”

The official sounded concerned as he suspected that criminals across the country could have gone through the same process and acquired more than one identity card. However, sources in the interior ministry and close to Nadra disagreed with the notion and said the issue of dual or more than one identity card emerged a few years ago and the authority, through a years-long procedure, had marked all those persons who had acquired multiple CNICs with different identities.

“Nadra even lodged FIRs against several persons for such illegal attempts,” said the ministry official. “Now no one can breach the system of identification for more than one CNIC and in this particular case, the authority must already have marked the suspect as a person with more than one card.”

He said in most of the cases facts carried by one of the two cards were original while it was witnessed in the past that some ‘insiders’ assisted people in breaching the system and acquiring CNICs with different credentials.

“The police authorities normally approach Nadra to get details of the marked person. So it should not be an excuse as all those persons who have acquired more than one CNIC are marked and traceable,” he added.