Video: NICs with printed data for first time in SL

28 February 2014 10:32 am

National Identity Cards (NIC) with holder-related data printed in Sinhala and Tamil was issued for the first time today since its introduction in 1972. The data will no longer be handwritten as before.

Some 200 bilingual identity cards were printed and issued today amid technical difficulties which caused a slight delay.

Department of Registration of Persons’ Commissioner General R.M.S. Sarath Kumara said this was the first major change made to the national identity cards in its 42-year history.

Mr. Sarath Kumara said this change was made overcoming several technical snags. “Many people think it is easy but it is not so,” he said.

Mr. Sarath Kumara said the printed bilingual identity cards would be replaced with the electronic identity cards in 2016. He said his department now moving away from a manual system to a forward-looking automated system in the future. (Yohan Perera)

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Pix by Pradeep Pathirana