KARACHI: For the last seven years, 24-year-old Raees Khan has running from one NADRA office to the next - in his hometown Hyderabad as well as Karachi - to get his national identity card.

He has met dozens of government officials, union councillors, lawyers and quite a few touts and middlemen. They have asked him everything from the bizarre to the ridiculous - including presenting his dead father to paying Rs300,000 for the computerised national identity card (CNIC).

He could neither resurect his father, who died a decade ago, or raise the Rs300,000 demanded by a ‘middleman’ in Hyderabad who promised to get him the NIC.

Now, his latest port of call is the Sindh High Court, where he has filed a petition detailing his ordeal in getting himself recognised as a citizen of Pakistan.

The lack of an identity card poses a lot of problem. You can’t have a mobile phone SIM issued, cannot open a bank account, or provide proof of identification during snap checks or travel.

For Raees, the NADRA run-arounds began around 2016 after he completed his intermediate. He was about to turn 18 and ready to apply to universities.

His inability to get the CNIC card in time for admissions was a spanner in the works but he was confident of continuing his studies after a gap year. He as well as his siblings had done their basic schooling in Hyderabad and had all the documents to prove it.

During that time, Raees took up work at a shop at the Tower Market in Hyderabad.

What Raees thought would be a year has now stretched to seven years. He has continued in the same job and is still waiting to get his NADRA card.

He has since become a regular at half dozen NADRA offices in Hyderabad, while also frequenting the national identity card providers offices in Karachi.

“They tell me to bring my father. But he died in 2012,” says Raees. When asked about his mother, the Pashtoon youth says that she abandoned the family soon after their father’s murder. “She is not coming to verify that I am her child.”

He said that his paternal family members have credentials, including the CNIC, and they would happily vouch for him. “But the Nadra people say that is not enough.”

It is not just Raees whose life and future is at stake. He is the eldest of seven siblings. His 21-year-old brother has also taken up a small-time job after failing to get the CNIC card required for university admission.