Biometric verification failures are creating serious hurdles for Pakistan’s senior citizens, raising urgent questions about how elderly people can complete basic legal processes when fingerprints no longer work due to age.
Imran Malik – MediaBites – December 29, 2025
For many senior citizens in Pakistan, everyday tasks are becoming unexpectedly stressful. The experience of Sardar Alam, a man in his early 80s, brings attention to a growing and very human problem: biometric verification failures and the lack of a clear solution for elderly citizens.
Sardar Alam recently sold his car. What should have been a straightforward transfer process turned into a frustrating ordeal. Despite trying biometric verification at three different locations, the system failed every time. His fingerprints, weakened naturally by age, simply did not register.
This raises an important question: what is an 80-plus citizen supposed to do in such situations?
An industry professional suggested an informal workaround. According to him, some people pay money at the excise and taxation office, bring a family member along, take a photograph inside the vehicle, and then complete the process using the son’s biometric verification instead of the elderly owner’s. While this may work in practice, it is deeply troubling.
- Why should senior citizens be pushed toward unofficial and questionable solutions?
- Why is there no clearly defined, lawful alternative for people whose biometrics no longer work due to age?
- And why does a system designed for security end up creating hardship for the most vulnerable?
Pakistan’s biometric framework, led by NADRA, has undoubtedly improved transparency and reduced fraud. However, fingerprint-based systems are known worldwide to fail for elderly people because of thinning skin, medical conditions, and natural ageing. This is not an exception; it is a biological reality.
Does NADRA’s facial recognition system, IRIS, provide an answer?
If it does, another key question follows. Is IRIS fully integrated with provincial Excise and Taxation departments? And if not, why are citizens left without guidance?
Senior citizens should not have to rely on relatives’ biometrics, pay unofficial fees, or feel helpless simply to exercise their legal rights. As Pakistan’s population ages, its systems must become more flexible, more humane, and more inclusive.
What is needed is simple and urgent. A clear alternative verification process for elderly citizens, proper coordination between NADRA and Excise and Taxation departments, and transparent communication so people know their options.
This is not just a technical issue. It is about dignity, access, and respect.
Someone at NADRA needs to respond, not with silence, but with empathy and a practical solution.
2 Comments
Photograph identification should be used for senior citizens in absense of fingerprints, bc senior citizens are facing much problems in their routine matters and are dependent on other persons which is a botheration for both.
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