PRESIDENT TO LAUNCH NATIONAL CAMPAIGN
ON BIRTH CERTIFICATES
A national campaign
on Birth Certificates will be launched during the Child Rights
Week November 14-20, 2003 to create awareness on the need of Birth
Certificates for all children in the country. Birth Certificates
will also be issued to children who do not have it during this
weeklong campaign. The President, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam has kindly
consented to launch the campaign at a function to be held at the
Rashtrapati Bhawan on November 14, 2003. During the function Birth
Certificates will be distributed to selected children by the President.
The registration
of birth has been recognized as the right of the child by the
UN Convention on Child Rights, 1989. Government of India being
a signatory to this Convention is bound to ensure complete registration
of all births in the country. This is considered as the first
step to provide an identity to the child and hence, is also important
in the context of the proposed multi-purpose National Identity
Card Project.
It is estimated
that about one crore children among 1.4 crore that are registered
every year do not get birth certificates. Approximately 10 crore
children below 10 years of age do not have the birth certificates.
It is therefore proposed that birth certificates will be issued
to such children who do not have birth certificates during this
national campaign. In the first phase of the campaign those children
whose births have been registered and are living within the village/town
of their birth would be targeted, as their birth must have been
registered in the same village/town. In the second phase of campaign
children born in places other than the village/town where they
are currently staying would be targeted. This phase would involve
getting the birth certificates from the place where they were
born and distributed to the children. It is also proposed to cover
all the children whose births have not been registered in the
third phase, where the births would be registered and certificates
issued.
The aim of the
campaign is also that the issuing of birth certificates to the
children is expected to create awareness among the public about
the functioning of the registration system and the child’s right
to get a birth certificate on registration done in time. Moreover,
in the absence of complete registration of births and deaths,
the country is not in a position to get estimates of indicators
like Birth Rate, Death Rate, Infant Mortality Rate, etc. which
are needed to prepare action plans and monitor their implementation
for family planning, reducing Infant Mortality etc. The National
Population Policy has set the target of achieving 100 per cent
registration of births and deaths by 2010.
