NADRA offices to reopen from May 04 to facilitate Ehsaas beneficiaries

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has decided to reopen country-wide National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) offices from May 04 amid lockdown during coronavirus pandemic, ARY NEWS reported.

The offices will perform bio-metric verification on the beneficiaries of the Ehsaas programme amid special arrangements made for the visitors to maintain social distancing due to coronavirus pandemic.

The verification process would be carried out using 600 NADRA centres and 200 mobile vans. The centres would remain open from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm.

The NADRA officials have been directed to ensure preventive measures at the offices before resuming the activity including provision of hand gloves and sanitizers to employees.

It is pertinent to mention here that as part of precautionary measures against the spread of novel coronavirus, the government decided to close all the public dealing offices, including National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA), passport and immigration and CDA One Window for two weeks across the country on March 20.

According to the details, the Ministry of Interior said that regional head offices of the public dealing offices will remain functional with minimum essential staff for some time.

Coronavirus tally reaches 15,759 cases

The coronavirus count reached 15,759 in Pakistan as 874 new cases reported within 24 hours in the country, according to the latest statistics released by National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) on Thursday.

According to the national dashboard, these include 6,061 cases in Punjab, 5,695 in Sindh, 2,313 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 978 in Balochistan, 333 in Gilgit-Baltistan, 313 in Islamabad Capital Territory and 66 in Azad Kashmir.

19 deaths were reported during last 24 hours, taking the tally to 346 while 4,052 patients recovered from the virus and 153 are still critical.