All Reported Births, Deaths To Be Digitally Registered From October 1

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(Source: The Hindu, 09/14/2023)

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Why in the news?

• Recently, the Union government notified that all reported births and deaths in the country will be digitally registered on the Centre’s portal as the Registration of Births and Deaths (Amendment) Act, 2023 will come into effect on October 1st, 2023.
• The centralized database will update the National Population Register (NPR), ration cards, property registration, and electoral rolls.

Registration of Births and Deaths (Amendment) Act, 2023

• The Registration of Births and Deaths (Amendment) Act 2023 regulates the registration of births and deaths and all connected matters.
• Aim: Promote uniformity and comparability in the registration of Births and Deaths across the country
• The Registrar General of India has jurisdiction over births and deaths at the central level, Chief Registrars at the state level, District Registrars at the district level, and Registrars at the local level.
• The States and Union Territories have to maintain individual databases, under the operative control of the Registrar General of India, on the Civil Registration System.
• Penalties: Births, stillbirths, and deaths must be registered within 21 days of their occurrence with violations of the rules incurring a penalty of ₹5.

Changes made to the Act

• Registration of birth and death: Databases must be maintained at the central level under the Registrar General of India and the state level under the Chief Registrars.
• Death certificate: All medical institutions must provide a certificate as to the cause of death to the Registrar and a copy of the same to the nearest relatives.
• However, for deaths that occur outside a hospital, the certificate has to be issued by the medical practitioner who attended the patient most recently.
• Issuing of certificates: Certificates must be issued by the registrar to the applicant within 7 days.
• Provision of electronic certificate: The Amendment provides for the issuance of electronic certificates instead of extracts of the certificate as provided in the earlier act.
• Centralized database: States must compulsorily register births and deaths on the Centre’s Civil Registration System (CRS) portal and share data with the RGI which functions under the Union Home Ministry.
• 360° surveillance: The central database will be updated in real-time, independent of location and without any human interface.
• Interoperability: The centralized database will be used to update other registers such as the National Population Register, Electoral Register, Driving license, Aadhaar, Ration card, Passport, etc.
• Digital birth certificate: Digital birth certificates will be issued as a single document that can be used for admission to educational institutions, driving licenses, passports, and Aadhar applications, government jobs, voter enrolment, and marriage registrations.
• Others:
  • It necessitates the collection of Aadhaar numbers of parents, and family members by the authorities to provide birth and death certificates.
  • At present, either parent voluntarily provides their Aadhaar number for a newborn’s birth certificate generated through the CRS.
  • Aadhaar details will also be collected to facilitate registration in noninstitutional adoption centers.
  • As of March 31, Aadhaar has a saturation of 93% for a projected population of 138.72 crore.
  • Appeals: Any person aggrieved by any order of the Registrar or District Registrar may appeal to the District Registrar or Chief Registrar, respectively.
  • Such appeals must be made within 30 days from receipt of such action or order.
  • The District Registrar or Chief Registrar must give their decision within 90 days from the date of appeal.

Challenges

• Corruption: People might become vulnerable to exploitation by those facilitating the registration process due to the high levels of illiteracy among the population.
• Inaccurate data: According to estimates, nearly 55 lakh voters were deleted from the system as a result of the Aadhaar-voter ID linking.
• State-level databases: Experts have questioned the need for a national-level database when there are state-level databases as it would primarily aggregate state-level databases.
• Privacy: While birth and death registers are public information and the RBD Act only needs an enabling provision to share information, other databases will require the amendment of laws or executive orders under which they are maintained.
  • However, it only lists specific databases and allows future additions by the government which raises concerns about misuse of data and overriding the role of Parliament.

Way Forward

• Alternatives for efficient sharing of data could have been adopted such as a system in which the Central database is updated on a daily or real-time basis from the State-level database based on standards specified by the Registrar General of India.
• This central database can be made available to authorities dealing with the maintenance and preparation of various national databases.
• A judicious blend of modernization and data privacy is required to ensure that the government’s objectives are met while the individual’s information is safeguarded.

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FAQs

MCQ

Question: Consider the following statements with respect to the National Population Register (NPR)

1. It is a list of usual residents of the country.
2. A usual resident of the country is one who has been residing in a local area for at least the last six months or intends to stay in a particular location for the next six months.
3. It is similar to the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 only

(b) 1 and 2 only

(c) 1 and 3 only

(d) 1, 2 and 3