Court: Passports should have provision to name stepparent
Holding that relationships constantly get redefined and legal issues become more complex as society evolves, the Madras high court has said passport applications must have suitable columns to indicate names of biological parents or adoptive parents or stepparents, or all of them, as the situation demands.Justice V Ramasubramanian, taking into account the predicament of divorced parents who remarry and then want to make suitable changes in passports of their children, on Friday said the ministry should come up with innovative steps such as additional columns for stepparents in passport applications.
He was issuing directions on a petition filed by B S Deepa, who wanted to change the initials of her 13-year-old daughter. She married M Irudayaraj in 1998, and they had a girl, I Kerenshruthi. They got divorced in 2003. The child remained with the mother, and her initial was changed to `D'.In 2013, Deepa married R Lakshmanan, gave the girl in adoption to him and wanted the initial to be changed to `L'.
The minor girl's passport application was kept pending due to the `discrepancy'. While the birthhospital records showed her biological father as Irudayaraj, the passport application said it Lakshmanan.Deepa filed the petition seeking a direction to passport authorities to accept the changed initial.
Justice Ramasubramanian said that while it was necessary to secure a passport for the minor girl at the earliest, it was also necessary to ensure the emergent needs did not destroy the future rights of the child. In this regard, he visualised three situations: One, even if passport authorities changed the name of the biological father, it will be in conflict with the entry found in the birth register; two, if there is yet another marriage, is it possible to change the name of parents every time there is a divorce followed by a fresh marriage; three, if the biological father leaves behind a large estate, will it be possible for the child to establish her identity and claim the right of inheritance, after changing the name in all records?
Holding that Deepa's act of giving her daughter in adoption to the stepfather as invalid, Justice Ramasubramanian pointed out that as per Section 9 of the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act, 1956 a mother could give her child in adoption only if the biological father is dead or renounced the world or ceased to be a Hindu.In this case none of these has happened. “The fundamental premise on which the Hindu adoption law proceeds is that the relationship between the biological parents and the children can never get severed, except in accordance with the provisions of this Act,“ he said.
The judge then asked passport authorities to issue a passport to Deepa's daughter indicating Lakshmanan as stepfather in the column for father's name, within four weeks.
He was issuing directions on a petition filed by B S Deepa, who wanted to change the initials of her 13-year-old daughter. She married M Irudayaraj in 1998, and they had a girl, I Kerenshruthi. They got divorced in 2003. The child remained with the mother, and her initial was changed to `D'.In 2013, Deepa married R Lakshmanan, gave the girl in adoption to him and wanted the initial to be changed to `L'.
The minor girl's passport application was kept pending due to the `discrepancy'. While the birthhospital records showed her biological father as Irudayaraj, the passport application said it Lakshmanan.Deepa filed the petition seeking a direction to passport authorities to accept the changed initial.
Justice Ramasubramanian said that while it was necessary to secure a passport for the minor girl at the earliest, it was also necessary to ensure the emergent needs did not destroy the future rights of the child. In this regard, he visualised three situations: One, even if passport authorities changed the name of the biological father, it will be in conflict with the entry found in the birth register; two, if there is yet another marriage, is it possible to change the name of parents every time there is a divorce followed by a fresh marriage; three, if the biological father leaves behind a large estate, will it be possible for the child to establish her identity and claim the right of inheritance, after changing the name in all records?
Holding that Deepa's act of giving her daughter in adoption to the stepfather as invalid, Justice Ramasubramanian pointed out that as per Section 9 of the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act, 1956 a mother could give her child in adoption only if the biological father is dead or renounced the world or ceased to be a Hindu.In this case none of these has happened. “The fundamental premise on which the Hindu adoption law proceeds is that the relationship between the biological parents and the children can never get severed, except in accordance with the provisions of this Act,“ he said.
The judge then asked passport authorities to issue a passport to Deepa's daughter indicating Lakshmanan as stepfather in the column for father's name, within four weeks.
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