The Nepali Citizenship Act passed in 2006 had made provisions to make citizenship available to children through both mother’s and father’s citizenship. Prior to this, citizenship could be acquired only through father’s identity. The act was meant to ease the process but the practice has become even more cumbersome than before. When previously only the father’s citizenship was required to obtain a citizenship certificate, now an individual seeking citizenship through her mother needs to submit the citizenship certificates of both the mother and the father.
In addition, other documents like marriage certificate of parents and recommendation letters from the VDC are required. Moreover, local bodies like VDCs do not even want to register the births of babies without the relevant information of the baby’s father. Even though the law states that birth certificates can be issued by recording father’s information as “unavailable”, the officials in local bodies are either unaware of these provisions, or unwilling to cooperate. End result of all this: Acquiring citizenship has become much harder for those whose fathers’ identities are not known or whose fathers have not wished to cooperate.
A citizenship certificate does not just create the identity of its bearer. Among other things like the right to residence, a citizenship document is required to open a bank account, to buy or sell land, to obtain jobs in the formal sector, and to obtain a passport. Without a citizenship, a person cannot legally own a home or travel abroad.
Obtaining this most vital document, however, is not easy. It requires the recommendation of at least one male family member, be it a father, brother, or husband. These practices seem to be rooted in ancient social values where the citizenship is also a mechanism for social control, ensuring that only women who follow the prevalent social norms are accepted by society, and denying women’s agency regarding their reproductive lives. In the process, it victimizes many women who are left without male support for no fault of their own.
Though our law states that birth certificates can be issued just through mothers, local bodies are unwilling to cooperate.
These provisions are very problematic for single mothers who have no way of getting in touch with their husbands. And in any society, there are more single mothers than single fathers because of women having the primary responsibilities of child care. The provision of citizenship only through the father is even more problematic for victims of rape or sexual abuse, who have no way, or in some cases, no wish to obtain citizenship for their child through the father. As a society, if we deny single mothers the opportunity to pass on their citizenship rights to their children, we are humiliating women.
Many activists of Nepal have been raising voice for registering births, because births, marriages, migration, and deaths, are important demographic information that are valuable to the state even beyond an individual’s citizenship rights. But officials in local bodies are often afraid of getting in trouble for registering a birth without the father’s information, because birth certificates can be used to apply for citizenships in the future. A gap between theory and practice is evident here, and it is essential that the government raise awareness of the law among its officials, and focus on appointing more women in every level of the government apparatus who will be more cooperative towards single mothers. It is important that any person born through a Nepali father, or mother, be given equal opportunities to obtain a citizenship.
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