Context:
Recently, the Union Home Ministry proposed amendment to the Registration of Birth and Death (RBD) Act, 1969. The bill will be introduced in the winter session of parliament.
Relevance:
GS II: Government Policies and Interventions
Dimensions of the Article:
- What changes are being proposed?
- Need for the Amendments
- About Registration of Birth and Death (RBD) Act, 1969
What changes are being proposed?
- It has been proposed to make birth certificates a mandatory document for almost every sphere of life — admission in educational institutions, inclusion in the voter list, appointment in Central and State government jobs, issue of driving licence and passport.
- It shall be mandatory for hospitals and medical institutions to provide a copy of all death certificates, stating the cause of death, to the local registrar apart from the relative of the deceased.
- The country’s birth registration level improved to 92.7% in 2019 from 82.0% in 2010, and the level of recorded deaths increased from 66.9% in 2010 to 92.0% in 2019, according to the Civil Registration System (CRS) report.
- CRS is an online system for registration of births and deaths under the operational control of the RGI.
Need for the Amendments
- The proposed amendments will make it possible for the Ministry of Home Affairs’ (MHA) Registrar General of India (RGI) to “keep a database of registered births and deaths at the national level.”
- The RGI will provide a birth and death database at the national level that may be used to update the Aadhar, ration card, passport, driving licence, population register, and electoral register databases.
- If the changes are made, the Center might use the information to update the National Population Register (NPR), which was created in 2010 and updated in 2015 via door-to-door enumeration.
- According to the Citizenship Rules of 2003, the NPR is the first step toward the formation of a National Register of Citizens, and it already has
About Registration of Birth and Death (RBD) Act, 1969
- Registration of Births and Deaths in India is mandatory with the enactment of RBD, Act 1969 and is done as per the place of occurrence of the event.
- The RBD Act mandates that births and deaths be registered by the States.
- Facilities have been set up by state governments for keeping records of births, deaths, and registrations.
- Every State appoints a Chief Registrar who is in charge of carrying out the Act’s provisions.
- The work is performed by a hierarchy of authorities at the district and lower levels.
- The RGI, chosen in accordance with this Act, is in charge of organising and unifying the RBD Act’s execution.
-Source: The Hindu
