In the last one year, six cases of children who failed to get a birth certificate for lack of the father´s citizenship number have been lodged at the Forum for Woman, Law and Development and more mothers are visiting the office for the same reason, according to senior advocate at FWLD Meera Dhungana.
Births, deaths, marriages, divorces and migration are registered under the Personal Events Act and the ministry concerned ´considers´ registration of such personal events too important to let the public face any hassles while visiting local administration offices for such registrations. [break]
Not having a birth certificate, for instance, bars a child from getting admission to a good school, appearing in board examinations, receiving a government allowance in the case of Dalits and the underprivileged, opening a bank account and even taking an international flight. That is apart from the resulting sense of worthlessness and humiliation.
“We encourage registration of all personal events. It plays a great role in the compiling of accurate data, which is very important for planning and policy-making. We have been actively campaigning to promote birth registration since some time back. It is somehting very important for every child,” says Dinesh Thapaliya, spokesperson at the Ministry of Local Development.
“There is absolutely no problem if a woman cannot produce the identity of the child´s father. If she is a Nepali and claims that the child is hers, he or she is eligible for the birth certificate. The woman does not have even to say whether she is married or not.”
The provision sounds perfect. However, the reality is one of bitterness. The problem is local level officials responsible for registering births and handing over certificates have not been properly instructed to by the ministry people.
“It is the result of a patriarchic mindset. VDC secretaries throughout the country are generally males. And they hesitate to provide the certificate to a child who has a problem producing the citizenship certificate or identity of his or her father,” says Dhungana. “They should try to know the law and abide by it if they face any problems. But, in the present situation, VDC secretaries who refuse to provide birth registrations are not questioned by anyone.”
Dhungana is not exaggerating. Yagya Raj Joshi, secretary at Tinthana VDC in Kathmandu, has this to say : “It will require hundreds of years for man and woman to be treated equally. We cannot provide a birth certificate to a child who does not have a permanent address. And how can a woman who cannot show her husband´s identity have a permanent address? Next day if she marries another man she belongs to that new place.”
Joshi added that even the format of the birth certificate does not allow him to provide such a certificate to a child as it clearly asks for the father´s and grandfather´s citizenship numbers. And the marriage certificate also has to be produced, he maintains.
The government started a civil registration program in 1977 to provide people with personal events certificates. Birth registration was, however, not very popular until the numbers of Nepali students and migrants rose in later years. It has become prioritized more after various international agencies started lobbying for it.
“However, for women who are not supported by their husbands, it is an ordeal trying to get birth certificates for their children; it´s very unfair,” Dhungana remarked. “We are fighting the cases. We are sure we will win. But how many mothers can come to us to file their cases? And what of the rest of the children?”
FWLD has demanded that the format of the certificate and pre-requisite documents sought by VDC secretaries for providing the certificates be corrected without delay. “They should be okay with either the father´s or the mother´s identity or citizenship number. And another thing, they should not be asking for the marriage certificate of the parents or the the lineage of the child.”
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