New Delhi: The Kerala high court has allowed a person to include his mother’s name alone in the birth certificate, identity certificates and other documents.
Justice P.V. Kunhikrishnan, in an order issued on July 19, said a child of an unwed mother is also a citizen of this country and nobody can infringe any of his/her fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution.
“It is clear that it is the right of a person to include his mother’s name alone in the birth certificate, identity certificates and other documents. As I observed earlier, there are children of rape victims and children of unwed mothers in this country. Their right of privacy, dignity and liberty cannot be curtailed by any authority,” the judgment said, reported Bar and Bench.
The court made these observations while hearing a plea of a petitioner whose father’s name was different in three of his documents. The petitioner is the son of an unwed mother.
According to the report, the mother of the petitioner was only a minor when she was impregnated under mysterious circumstances by an unidentified person.
The court, therefore, directed the Registrar of Births and Deaths to expunge and remove the name of the petitioner’s father from the birth register maintained at the office and issue a certificate showing the name of mother only as a single parent.
The court referred to the provisions of the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 1969 and the Kerala Registration of Births and Deaths Rules, 1999 to make any corrections in documents.
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The court also said the state should protect citizens of all kind as equal to other citizens without disclosing their identity and privacy. “Otherwise, they will face unimaginable mental agonies,” it said.
It also cited a letter issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs in which the apex court had directed all chief registrars of births and deaths to follow the directions of the Supreme Court that in case of single/unwed mother, birth certificates may be issued after producing an affidavit, and without insisting on the identity of the father.
In 2015, the Supreme Court had directed municipal bodies to not insist on the name of the father while issuing birth certificate for children born outside wedlock. The apex court had said that in such cases the birth certificate should mention only the mother’s name.
The court had also directed the general education department, the board of higher secondary examinations, the UIDAI, the IT department, the passport officer, the Election Commission of India and the State Election Commission to effect the consequential expunge of the name of the father from their official records and databases.
(With PTI inputs)