Larkana: In a shocking administrative error, Pakistan’s National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) has listed a living man as deceased in its official records, causing outrage and confusion.
According to local reports, Allah Bakhsh Soomro, a taxi driver from the town of Bada near Larkana, discovered the error when he visited a NADRA office to apply for his son’s national identity card. Officials informed him that, according to government records, he was “dead.”
Speaking to journalists outside the Larkana Press Club, Soomro said, “I am alive and standing here, yet the system has declared me dead.”
He added that NADRA officials told him his son’s identity card could not be issued until he had his “death record” removed by the local town committee.
A NADRA spokesperson explained that death certificates are issued by municipal and union council authorities, and the agency updates its records based on the data provided by them.
The spokesperson confirmed that Soomro’s request to cancel the false death record has been received and that he has been advised to return on Monday so his record can be corrected and restored to the list of living citizens.
The affected citizen has appealed to higher authorities to investigate the incident and take disciplinary action against those responsible.
Rights advocates say such errors highlight serious flaws in Pakistan’s administrative systems and call for stronger verification processes to prevent similar cases in the future.
