Ever heard of a son older than his father? No, this isn’t a science fiction story or a new Netflix series it’s a real-life NID blooper from Mandarkandi village in Nabiganj upazila of Habiganj, Bangladesh.
According to his National Identity Card (NID), Jitu Mia was born on March 2, 1887. That makes him a whopping 138 years old in 2025! Meanwhile, his father, Haris Mia, was born in 1950 a youthful 75 years old. Yes, you read that right: on paper, Jitu Mia is 63 years older than his own dad.
How did this time-travel-level math happen? Well, the mystery dates back to 2007, during Bangladesh’s big move to a digital voter list. Somewhere between data entry and digital dreams, Jitu Mia’s age took a leap not by a year or two, but by an entire century.
Jitu Mia, who recently returned from abroad, only discovered the comical catastrophe when he tried to enroll his 12-year-old son in a madrasa. The madrasa took one look at his NID and, understandably, raised an eyebrow. After all, it’s not every day a 138-year-old comes in claiming to be the father of a schoolchild.
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And the surprises didn’t stop there. “I didn’t go to school, so I didn’t understand what they wrote in the ID,” Jitu explained. “Now I see it says I was born in the 1800s! I wasn’t even a thought back then!”
His daughter’s admission hit the same wall. As if raising kids wasn’t challenging enough, now he has to prove he isn’t a time traveler from the British Raj.
Determined to set the record straight, Jitu Mia has been on a whirlwind tour of government offices from the Union Parishad to the Election Commission and even the district court. He filed an affidavit and recently submitted an official application to the Upazila Nirbahi Officer (UNO), who kindly assured him that this accidental case of “Benjamin Button” would be fixed.
The local Election Commission officer, Uttam Kumar Das, explained that the error likely occurred during the early days of digitization in 2007. “We need a corrected digital birth certificate to fix the age,” he said. Unfortunately, Jitu’s birth certificate has its own issues a sequel to the saga.
The UNO, Md. Ruhul Amin, added, “He doesn’t have any education certificate to prove his real age. We’ve asked him to collect a medical age report from the Civil Surgeon. Once we get that, we’ll try to fix the records.”
For now, Jitu Mia is playing the role of “the ancient man of Nabiganj,” walking around with the wisdom (and paperwork) of someone born in the 19th century. Locals may joke, but Jitu’s ready to clear his name or at least get back to being a normal dad in his fifties.
So, next time you think your paperwork is a mess, just remember Jitu Mia the man who outran time, beat his dad in the age race, and is still fighting to get his son into school.
