ISLAMABAD, March 5: The Nadra has planned to launch special drive for free registration of women throughout the country on the occasion of International Women Day on March 8.

The special campaign titled as, 'Women Registration Drive,' aims at achieving the target of 100 per cent registration of women by making them aware of the importance of registration to get their basic rights.

“The International Women's Day (IWD) on March 8, 2011 will be marked by Nadra with the commencement of free registration for the unregistered women in the country as they would be provided national identity cards free of cost,” Deputy Chairman Nadra Muhammad Tariq Malik said in a statement issued here on Saturday.

He said that women formed around 51 per cent of the population and were a vital segment of the society and progress without their unhindered participation in all spheres of national life could not be made. “It is imperative that they should earn a respectable place in the international arena,” he added.

“Nadra wants to empower women for their basic rights and the drive aims at increasing women registration to have more accurate data to facilitate national planning commission in decision making,” Tariq Malik further said.

He said that Nadra was making all-out efforts to get the adult population in Pakistan especially the women registered in a minimum possible time to facilitate them in getting education, health, employment and other facilities.

Tariq Malik said, “CNIC is an essential identity document which protects women's rights. It is evident through the fact that first time in history their rights are safeguarded when in flood-hit areas women as family heads were given Watan Cards and Nadra issued as many as 121,640 Watan Cards to disburse Rs2.43 billion among woman family heads.”

He said that the registration ratio in some areas had been very low as social norms, illiteracy, poverty and female mobility issues were the major factors besides lack of awareness about the benefits of registration.

He said that approximately 74 per cent women had been registered in the country.

He said that 96 per cent women in Azad Kashmir and 90 per cent women in Islamabad regions got themselves registered and these were the highest women registration percentage in the country.

He said that the women registration in Fata and Balochistan was at the lowest with approximately 44 per cent and 56 per cent women registered in the database respectively.

While giving details about other provinces he said that 79 per cent women in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 76 per cent in Punjab, 70 per cent in Sindh and 83 per cent in Gilgit-Baltistan had registered them in the national database.