KARACHI: A tech-based initiative of the Sindh police in collaboration with the Citizens-Police Liasion Committee (CPLC) and a non-government poverty alleviation organisation is emerging as a fresh success in building a database of domestic labourers, industrial and corporate workers and hundreds of thousands of blue-collar employees of different organisations where their data can be verified before appointment with the aim of bringing 50 million unregistered and unbanked such workers out of poverty, officials and people involved in the process said on Sunday.

They said that until a few months ago this facility did not exist, but now, with the help of technology, the police were able to verify the entire workforce in factories, which could number in thousands, within seconds.

“We introduced this employee verification system, in collaboration with the police and the CPLC in August 2020, which was formally launched by Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid in December 2020,” said Ahmedyar Janjua, co-founder of the Safe Pakistan Welfare Trust (SPWT), which envisaged and executed the idea with the law enforcement agencies. “Using this platform, households and companies can verify their entire workforce at the click of a button. Launched under the name of Tasdeeq Pakistan, this service which was initially envisioned for the common household has now been extended to the corporate sector, and is being met with remarkable success.”

He said the SPWT is aimed at bringing 50 million unregistered and unbanked blue-collar workers out of poverty. With this service — Tasdeeq Pakistan — blue-collar workers would be able to create a verifiable work and performance history for themselves and in turn it would open a wide range of job opportunities and allow financial institutions to forward them services as well, he added.

The project has already started yielding results as the large-scale industrial sector has started utilising the service for police verification of its thousands of workers which they claimed was a hectic exercise before the launch of Tasdeeq Pakistan.

‘Households and companies can verify their entire workforce at the click of a button’

“Whenever we hire anyone these days, we run their verification process through Tasdeeq Pakistan, and once cleared, we are able to offer them a little premium based on their having a lack of a criminal record. We ran close to 3,000 of our employees through this platform and the efficiency and speed with which we got the result, is truly remarkable,” said Waqas Abrar, group head of Lucky Cement’s human resources.

‘An essential feature’

Akhtar Younis, representing the CPLC in Korangi Industrial Area, endorsed the use of Tasdeeq Pakistan, characterising it as an “essential feature which should be used by companies and households for verification of their employees”.

“This verification process would help households and companies identify criminals, as well as keep themselves safe from crimes by providing police with this data,” he said and added that the technology was helping the industrial sector with common employees and domestic workers. The police authorities are confident that apart from registration and database building of workers, the project would also help them keep petty crimes under control to a large extent.

“Services like Tasdeeq Pakistan would play a great role in reducing crimes perpetrated by domestic and industrial workers if the information is promptly received by the police through their registration,” said DIG-South Javed Akbar Riaz.

Mr Janjua of the SPWT said that with the passage of time and growing awareness the companies across the country were using this innovative application. From the biggest food delivery company of the country, having registered more than 6,000 individuals, and identified over 50 people with previous criminal records, to the country’s leading textile company based outside Lahore, with above 7,000 of their workers are registered on this system.

“Over 6,500 businesses across the country are using this facility, including 65,000 plus households that have registered their workers using this service. Tasdeeq has penetrated almost every sector in the entire country,” he said. “The police, while providing this service have filled a huge security gap for both households, and the entire industrial sector of our country. What’s next for Tasdeeq? Spread the word, enable our companies and households to start using this to make our homes and business spaces safe for us while Tasdeeq gears up its next phase, offering value-added services such as group health insurance and other empowerment schemes to our underbanked and impoverished household and corporate employees.”

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2021