: A public interest litigation petition has been filed in the Madras High Court Bench here challenging State Government’s recent decision to empower executive magistrates not below the rank of Revenue Divisional Officer to order registration of births and deaths, that had not been registered within one year of their occurrence, without insisting upon the existing practice of getting them registered through lower court orders.
After hearing preliminary arguments, a Division Bench of Justices A. Selvam and P. Kalaiyarasan on Tuesday directed Additional Government Pleader D. Muruganantham to accept notice on behalf of the Health Secretary and file a counter affidavit by February 15. Advocate P. Thoothai Muniyasamy had filed the petition, through his counsel RM. Arun Swaminathan, challenging the validity of a Government Order issued by the Health Department on December 2.
The Government Order had been issued for publishing a notification appended to it in the government gazette. The notification, in turn, stated that the Governor, with the approval of the Centre, had decided to amend Tamil Nadu Registration of Births and Deaths Rules, 2000 and insert sub rule (3) in Rule 9 thereby empowering the executive magistrates to order registration of all births and deaths which had not been registered by the family members within a year.
The petitioner contended that it would not be appropriate to dispense with the process of judicial proceedings for getting the births and deaths registered and empower government officials to pass such orders. He claimed that the process of registration would get delayed if the amendment was brought into effect since the government officials such as RDOs were already burdened with other works such as issuing Pattas (revenue record for land ownership).
Claiming that the amended rule was yet to be published in the gazette as ordered in the G.O., Mr. Muniasamy said that junior advocates practising in the lower courts would face financial crisis if the amendment was permitted.
