Over the past six months, citizens applying for birth and death registrations in Bangladesh have faced significant inconveniences due to persistent issues with the online payment system. As of late November last year, the e-payment gateway, designed to facilitate smooth transaction processes, has been non-operational, forcing applicants to revert to manual payment methods.
The disruption began when applicants reported frequent ‘server down’ notices upon visiting the registration offices, a problem that peaked from June to November last year. The Ministry of Finance’s integrated e-payment system, iBAS++, which handles these transactions, has reportedly been unable to cope with the high volume of requests, leading to its suspension.
During the manual process, applicants are required to pay a fixed fee of 50 BDT at the time of submission, which is then deposited into the national treasury via challan. The registrar’s offices, managed by ward councilors, city corporation mayors, and union parishad chairmen, have seen a steady influx of such manual transactions, especially since the e-payment suspension.
According to the Registrar General’s Office, there were 58,749 manual transactions recorded in a single day on May 6, with a total of 69,908 applications processed for both new registrations and amendments. From January to April this year, over 3.29 million birth registrations and approximately 288,000 death registrations were completed.
The switch to manual payments began on November 26 last year after the online system failed to improve despite multiple attempts to address the technical issues. By the end of November, the number of registrations had surged to 600,000, and by December, it had surpassed one million.
Efforts to enhance server capacity have been significant. In April, the system’s capacity was increased from 72 terabytes to 322 terabytes, and the document attachment limit per application was raised from 100 kilobytes to 2 megabytes, aiming to accommodate the high demand more effectively.
Despite these upgrades, intermittent server downtimes still occur, although they have reduced in frequency. “The server isn’t down as often as before, and on average, we receive about 10 to 12 registration applications per day,” said Zahid Ferdous, the secretary of DNCC’s Ward 32.
The ongoing transition back to manual systems has reignited debates about the efficiency of digital services in public administration in Bangladesh. While the government explores a dual system of online and manual payments to accommodate all citizens, the focus remains on creating a more robust and reliable digital infrastructure to prevent such disruptions in the future.
