A parliamentary watchdog on Tuesday asked the liberation war affairs ministry to issue machine readable certificates for freedom fighters listed in the Mukti Barta, prepared by the Awami League in its previous term at the office, which is considered to be the most accurate list of freedom fighters.
The parliamentary standing committee on liberation war affairs at its meeting also said the ministry should issue machine readable certificates to other freedom fighters, who were not listed in the Mukti Barta, after verifying their names and other information.
"Our recommendation is, the ministry should issue the machine readable certificates to the freedom fighters listed in the Mukti Barta," Major (Rtd) Rafiqul Islam Bir Bikram, told the Dhaka Tribune after the meeting at the parliament building.
He said his committee has also suggested the ministry to publish list of the freedom fighters, not mentioned in the Mukti Barta, in the newspapers for notification. The persons having wrong name and/or address could easily turn to the government for correction.
"Then they can be given the machine readable certificates, which cannot be counterfeited," he said.
The ministry officials told in the meeting the government could issue at least 39,000 machine readable certificates by August.
The liberation war affairs ministry initiated the process of providing machine readable certificates in line with the recommendation of the standing committee.
The ministry on February 13 uploaded a list of 170,000 freedom fighters in its website. The government must verify the names of the freedom fighters before issuing the certificates as it provides various government facilities for the freedom fighters and their wards.
Committee members AKM Rahmatullah (Awami League), Joynal Abdin (BNP) and Ruby Rahman (Awami League) attended the meeting with Rafiqul Islam in the chair.
