Nadra to Verify Over Three Million Pensioners Under Revised SOPs

• Nadra will now conduct biometric verification and validate Proof of Life Certificates for civilian and military pensioners.
• Commercial banks will only disburse pensions and will no longer be responsible for routinely verifying or retaining biometric and life-certificate records.
• Pension accounts cannot be declared dormant, while the physical “Disburser’s Half” procedure has been abolished.

The federal government has revised the standard operating procedures for pension payments, transferring responsibility for biometric verification and Proof of Life Certificate validation from commercial banks to the National Database and Registration Authority.

The revised system will cover more than three million civilian and military pensioners across Pakistan and is intended to streamline verification, improve security and reduce banks’ administrative role in the process.

Official figures show that Pakistan has 1,848,151 civilian pensioners. These include 399,058 federal government pensioners, 610,823 from Punjab, 320,754 from Sindh, 225,112 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 100,528 from Balochistan.

The total also includes 51,641 pensioners from Azad Jammu and Kashmir, 16,005 from Gilgit-Baltistan and 124,230 retired employees of Pakistan Railways.

An additional 1,326,500 people receive military pensions, taking the total pensioner population covered by the revised arrangement to approximately 3.17 million.

The Ministry of Finance formally communicated the changes to the governor of the State Bank of Pakistan and the Controller General of Accounts following directives issued by the prime minister.

Under the new system, Nadra has been connected with the Controller General of Accounts and the Military Accountant General through a secure application programming interface. This integration will allow Digital Life Signals to be transmitted directly from Nadra to the two accounting authorities without passing through commercial banking channels.

Commercial banks will now operate solely as Pension Disbursement Agencies. Under normal circumstances, they will have no legal or administrative responsibility for collecting, verifying, retaining or validating pensioners’ biometric information or Proof of Life Certificates.

Banks may, however, serve as authorised operational channels for generating life certificates through Nadra’s designated system when required.

The revised SOPs also clarify that pension-disbursing bank accounts cannot be classified as dormant for the processing or payment of pensions. Standard banking dormancy requirements will therefore not apply to these accounts.

The updated procedures replace all previous arrangements and formally discontinue the physical “Disburser’s Half” system. Federal pensions will now be paid exclusively through the Direct Credit System.