Indian Government Servants and Alteration of their Date of Birth: Why things Misfire?

Indian Government Servants and Alteration of their Date of Birth: Why things Misfire?

Army General’s Date of Birth Row

            The Chief of the Indian Army General V.K.Singh has become famous over night not for claiming victory over Chinese incursion into Indian territories or for coming out with a code of conduct that could be enforced for Armed Forces under his command for maintaining cordial relationship with Civilian population. Since the six decade of Independence there has never been such a stand-off, an impasse between the Chief of the Army and the Ministry of Defense of the World’s largest Democracy. The issue is this:

1.       The Chief of the Army claims his date of birth as 10^th may 1951 and not 10^th May 1950 as asserted by the Government.

2.      If Government does not recognize that he is born in 1950, the General would not retire from the service with dignity and now the General Fights for his dignity. The very decision of the Government is arbitrary, unfair and unjust – This must be the core argument of the General, who like any other Government Servant have all legitimacy to seek redressal for his grievance.

What I wish to ask with all innocence and ignorance is,

(1)   When the General is so vigilant and cautious and vigilantly opposes the decision of the Ministry of Defense that has wrongly reported his date of birth, when it comes to affect him adversely, whether the same General would have applied the same yardstick of defiance and upheld his straightforward nature towards the orders passed by the Government that he has been implementing day in and day out f his three decade of Army Service?

However, since the whole issue is in the Supreme Court and already satellite televisions have started their trial and adjudication, let me respect the Judiciary and refrain from making any further comment on the ‘Date of Birth Row' until the Judiciary gives a ruling in the matter.

Alteration of Date of Birth and Government Employees

            Unlike in most countries of the world, in India, the tenure is fixed for Government Jobs. For instance, any person appointed by the Government of India would be in service until he attaining 62 years of Age ( Central Government Employees), 65 ( University Teachers and Supreme Court Judges) and 58 ( in the case of ministerial employees of the Government of Tamil Nadu and 55 years ( in Kerala).

            So as long a person is able to maintain he is born as late as possible, so long he/she can be in Government Service with its power, status and social capital. Hence among retiring persons barring a very few there is an inbuilt psyche that he/she need to overcome this retirement and some even think it is like defeating death but ultimately could just postpone it. This is the basic dynamics of Alteration of Date of Birth3of Government Employees.

Implication of Alteration of Date of Birth of an Individual and a Government Employee

            In both cases mentioned above, alteration of date of birth in the first case alters the census database of the population. We all know that Census Data indicates the demographic profile of the country apart from providing inputs for public policy formulation. This is one reason why every hospital whether private or public mandatorily sends the date of birth data of every born baby and in the case of death of a patient, the data same is sent to the concerned Local Government, which eventually gets reconciled and updated with the Demographic profile of the country.

            Hence, the altered date of birth should reflect in Passport, Ration Card, Electronic Photo Identity Card , driving Licence and other documents.

Financial Implications of Alteration of Date of Birth

            We all know that a person’s monthly salary is certainly more than his monthly pension if he retires from service in a proper manner. Now, given a situation that an individual postpones his date of retirement by altering his date of birth, the direct consequence is that the ‘public spending’ on that individual gets more than the amount to be disbursed to him in the event he retires.

Becoming young Over night and Straining Relationship with Junior Colleague

            The other effect, and more visible effect is that in an organization with very little upward movement by way of promotion, only retirement can create vacancies for higher positions and if a person manages to alter his date of birth and continues to occupy the office at the cost of “stomach burn”, “chest burn” and the bad will of his immediate junior colleague and thus win the war of money, perks and benefits at the cost of loosing inter-personal relationship.

What does the Supreme Court say in this matter?           

Supreme Court of India in Civil Appeal No.5422 of 1994 observed that the Rule 49 is to be harmoniously interpreted. The application for correction of date of birth of an in-service employees should be made within five years from the date when the rules had come into force i.e., 1961. If no application is made, after the expiry of 5 years, the Government employee loses his right to make an application for correction of his date of birth. In view of the decision of the Supreme Court of India in O.A.No.6055/94 the Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal observed that the instructions of the Government permitting applications for correction of date of birth to be made one year in advance of the date of Superannuation, according to the recorded date would require review. The Rule 49 and 49A of the General Rules for the Tamil Nadu State and Subordinate Services will be applicable irrespective of the date of entry into Government service.

Hence,

(i) Applications for alteration of date of birth should not be entertained under proviso to sub-rule (c) in rule 49 of General Rules for Tamil Nadu State and Subordinate Services.

(ii) Applications for alteration of date of birth now under process under the said proviso should be disposed of according to the observation of the Supreme Court of India.

(iii) The particulars of persons so far allowed alteration of date of birth on or after 3.8.94 should be sent to the Government immediately.

(Source: Government of Tamil Nadu Personnel and Administrative Department, Chennai – 9 Lr No. 154    Dated 24.5.1995. This applies to other states and union territories, because the TN State Subordinate Rules is in consonance with FR and GFR of Government of India)

An Extract of rule 49 of State Subordinate rules of Tamil Nadu, explaining the procedure for alteration of date of birth

49. Alteration of date of birth --(a) If, at the time of appointment, a candidate claims that hisdate of birth is different from that entered in his S.S.L.C. or Matriculation Register or School records, he shall make an application to the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission in cases where the appointment is made in consultation with the Commission and in other cases to the appointing authority stating the evidence on which he relies and explaining how the mistake occurred. The application shall be forwarded to the Commissioner of Revenue Administration for report after investigation by an officer not below the rank of a Deputy Collector and, on receipt of the report, the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission or the appointing authority, as the case may be, shall decide whether the alteration of date of birth may be permitted or the application may be rejected: Provided that in case of a candidate who was born outside the State of Tamil Nadu the investigation through the Commissioner of Revenue Administration shall be dispensed with and the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission or the appointing authority, as the case may be, shall examine and scrutinize the records that may be produced by the candidate and shall decide whether the alteration of date of birth may be permitted or the application may be rejected.

(b) After a person has entered service, an application to alter the date of his birth as entered in the official records shall be entertained only if such an application is made within five years of such Entry into service. Such an application shall be made to the authority competent to make an appointment to the post held by the applicant at the time of his application and shall be disposed of in accordance with the procedure laid down in sub-rule (a).(c) Any application received after five years after entry into service or any application, which is not supported by entries in Secondary School Leaving Certificate, School, College or University records, birth extract from records of local bodies or military discharge certificates, shall be summarily rejected.

(d) In considering the question of permitting an alteration on the date of birth as entered in the official records even when such entry is proved to have been due to a bonafide mistake, the Government or the appointing authority shall take into consideration the circumstance whether the applicant would normally be eligible for appointment to the post at the time of entry into service had his age been correctly stated and what would have been its effect on his service and the service conditions of other officers in the service and may permit the alteration subject to such condition as they or it may deem fit to impose:

Provided that the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission shall be consulted in the case of an applicant who has been initially recruited through the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission, if it is proposed to accept his request for alteration of date of birth.

(e) The Procedure laid down in sub-rule (a) shall be followed in all cases where alteration of date of birth is proposed suo motu by the Head of Office on the basis of medical opinion, in the absence of any other authoritative records.

Explanation - For the purpose of this sub-rule “authoritative records” are the secondary school leaving certificate or University, College, or School records or Discharge Certificate of Army.

(f) The decision of the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission, the appointing authority or the Government, as the case may be, shall be final.

Lessons to be learnt

Altering the Date of Birth is usually done to extend the service and never to reduce. In any case, if you can do it as per rules within five years of entry into service please does it if and only if you have proper, true documentary evidences. The only consoling aspect of the issue is that the problems of altering date of birth arise only in the case of people born mostly before 1960 and not after as gradually some kind of systematization of Registration of Birth is maintained in the country.   

Moral of the Story

            Don’t be greedy. Enough is enough. Death is inevitable; we tend to postpone it but never can we defeat it. Same is retiring from service. Retirement never stops a person’s activities. Many Nobel Laureates have won Nobel Prize for the work done after retirement. So please don’t worry.

If I were a personal friend of the General V K Singh, I would certainly request him to step down dignifiedly because individual’s self respect is not bigger than the esteem of the office he holds. He may be legally right, but morally incorrect (I don’t use the word “Wrong”).

( Picture Courtesy: www.dailymail.uk)