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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | IDs for 'invisible' children -Ananya Sengupta

IDs for 'invisible' children -Ananya Sengupta

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published Published on Nov 1, 2015   modified Modified on Nov 1, 2015
-The Telegraph

New Delhi: A Delhi government notification has paved the way for juvenile offenders and abandoned or surrendered children in the capital to get birth certificates if they lack one.

The move, expected to be replicated across the country, will give lakhs of invisible children an official identity and make it easier for them to get into school and secure government welfare and documents, such as scholarships, passports and PAN cards.

Only magistrates can now issue birth certificates, generally on the basis of provisional birth certificates issued by the delivery clinics. The notification, issued last week, allows Delhi's juvenile justice boards and district child welfare committees to issue delayed birth certificates after a medical test.

Sources said the Centre, which was a party to a Delhi High Court case that cleared the decks for the notification, would soon send advisories to all the states to follow suit.

The delayed birth certificates will carry a "fictionalised" date of birth that may be calculated on the basis of the date of apprehension of the child and the lower figure mentioned in the medical report.

For instance, if a juvenile offender is apprehended on June 30, 2016, and the medical test puts his age between 16 and 18, the date of birth will be mentioned as June 30, 2000, unless enquiries by the juvenile justice boards or child welfare committees suggest a different date.

Sources said the system would come into effect after the specifics of how to fix a child's identity in the absence of the parents' names or a detailed address of the birthplace are worked out.

It's been proposed that the birth certificate form be amended to include additional parameters like birthmarks or any other identification mark, and the child's photograph. The place of apprehension will serve as the birthplace.

"Each time a juvenile is apprehended now, he is taken for a medical test for age determination. Repeat offenders undergo medical tests each time they are caught," advocate Anant Asthana, who hailed the notification, said.

Since the medical reports mention a range rather than a specific age, he added, the multiple tests allow "the age of the juvenile to be manipulated" -by the police to have a minor tried as an adult or by an 18-plus accused to cheat the regular justice system.

Now, he said, "the first time a juvenile comes in contact with the child welfare committee or the juvenile justice board, his details will be recorded in the system with a fictionalised but specific date of birth, reducing the scope for ambiguity".

A child from one state apprehended or found in another can have a delayed birth certificate issued in the second state.

In January, Delhi High Court had prodded the government to allow the chairpersons of the child welfare committees and the principal magistrates conducting inquiries in the juvenile justice boards to issue delayed birth certificates after a medical test.

The court was hearing a public interest plea alleged that minors were being held illegally in regular jails.

The Telegraph, 1 November, 2015, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1151101/jsp/nation/story_50875.jsp#.VjW00ys1t_k


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