The Bombay high court has suggested that the Central government should consider including a column in the birth and death certificates that says “nationality as declared by applicant”. The insertion of such a column will ensure that the mention of nationality this way on the certificates will not be used as the proof of one’s nationality.
Division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice M.S. Sanklecha made the suggestion while hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) challenging the deletion of the nationality column from the birth and death certificates.
The judges were upset as the government has not taken instructions from the concerned department on the issue, even though a year has passed since the HC issued a notice to the government in connection with the PIL.
“Even if it (certificates) cannot be used as a final document of proof, you (government) can have a column ‘nationality as declared by applicant’,” Chief Justice Shah said on Thursday.
Union government lawyer Advait Sethna informed the court that the registrar-general (census operations) would be the concerned department to take instructions. “Notice was issued to the Union government last year. You have taken one year to identify which department is concerned in this matter,” the court said while granting the government time till September 29 to respond to the PIL.
A social worker, Shahajirao Thorat, had approached the high court challenging an order passed by the government on April 20, 2000, deleting the column of nationality from birth and death certificates. The certificates are issued under Section 12 and 17 of The Registration of Birth and Death Act. However, the nationality and permanent address column from the certificates was deleted in 2000.