Indian Express 04.03.2010
Now, ward offices to register marriages
Express News Service Tags : marriage registration, mumbai Posted: Thursday , Mar 04, 2010 at 2353 hrs
Mumbai: Starting this Friday, couples will be able to register their marriages at the city’s 24 ward offices. Following a delay of more than a year, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to provide marriage certificates, besides death and birth certificates.
Additional municipal commissioner Manisha Mhaiskar said those who wanted to register their marriages were facing problems after the offices of the deputy inspector general (DIG), Registrations and Stamps at Bandra court and Old Customs House in Fort, had stopped the registrations a few days ago. Following this, a group of youths had met municipal commissioner S Kshatriya to complain about the problems.
“We will train our officers and from this Friday people will be able to register at the Citizen’s Felicitation Centre,” Mhaiskar said, adding that uploading forms on the website will also be done soon.
The Medical Health Officer (MHO) at the ward level will act as marriage registrar under the clause 3 of the Maharashtra Marriage Council Regulation and Marriage Registration Act, 1998.
In 2007, the Supreme Court had ordered that marriage registration should be mandatory and the responsibility should be transferred from the state government to the ward officers in 22 municipal corporations and 222 municipal councils. The BMC had, however, said it was already burdened with civic duties and would not be able to cope with the additional work of marriage registration.
According to civic officials, the Bandra and Colaba offices had stopped accepting registration forms in view of the apex court order. As many as 30,000 marriages are registered a year and around Rs 50 lakh is collected as fee.
