Judicial magistrates can no longer issue birth and death certificates: Madras HC
Based on the report of the advocate commissioner and the GO, the bench passed the present order.
Chennai: Putting an end to the menace of obtaining fraudulent birth and death certificates based on orders obtained from judicial magistrates by furnishing false information, for the purpose of availing the service benefits or claim properties, the Madras high court has held that the judicial magistrates can no longer issue such certificates under the provisions of the Registration of Births and Death certificates Act.
A division bench comprising Justices S. Nagamuthu and P. N. Prakash also upheld a GO passed by the state government dated January 25, 2017, empowering only the executive magistrates, not below the rank of revenue divisional officer to deal with the applications for the issuance of such certificates.
“The judicial magistrates/metropolitan magistrates in the state cannot pass any order under section 13 (3) of the RBD Act after January 25, 2017. All pending matters are directed to be disposed of with liberty to the petitioners to take recourse to the executive magistrates concerned. Any entry made in the Register of Births and Deaths, pursuant to an order passed by judicial/metropolitan Magistrates after January 25, 2017, is non-est and such an entry should be deleted. We also direct the state government to issue necessary guidelines to the executive magistrates for dealing with petitions under section13 (3) of the RBD Act.
Originally the matter was taken up based on a father’s claim that his son was juvenile as per the date of birth certificate issued by the Magistrate at the time of an incident. On further enquiry, the bench found that in one year and 9 months, 4,13,751 birth and death certificates were issued by the judicial magistrates.
Therefore, in order to streamline the process and eliminate the possibilities of a fraudulent claim, the bench had appointed D Mohandoss, a retired district judge as advocate commissioner and directed him to file a report suggesting remedial measures and procedural guidelines for the judicial officers to follow. When the same was pending, the government passed an order empowering only the executive magistrates to deal with applications relating to the issuance of birth and death certificates. Based on the report of the advocate commissioner and the GO, the bench passed the present order.