Registration Of Births And Deaths (Amendment) Act To Come Into Force From October 1

Applications filed one to two years after a birth or death will still need an order from a district or sub-divisional magistrate

PGurus Newsdesk

September 17, 2026

The Registration of Births and Deaths (Amendment) Act, 2026 comes into force from October 1, requiring a Judicial Magistrate's order for births or deaths reported more than two years late

Birth, death registration after two years now needs a judicial magistrate’s order

The Registration of Births and Deaths (Amendment) Act, 2026 will come into force from October 1, tightening the rules governing delayed registration of births and deaths, Registrar General of India Mrityunjay Kumar Narayan announced in a gazette notification on Wednesday. The amendment, passed by both Houses of Parliament in August, became law after receiving the President’s assent last month, and is formally identified as Act No. 12 of 2026.

What Changes For Delayed Registrations

The amendment reworks Section 13(3) of the parent Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 1969 (itself last amended in 2023), specifically targeting cases where a birth or death is reported well after it occurred. For applications filed more than one year but within two years of the event, the rules stay largely as before — an order from a District Magistrate, Sub-Divisional Magistrate, or an Executive Magistrate authorised by the DM is still required, along with verification of the event’s correctness and payment of a prescribed fee.

The real shift is for cases reported more than two years after the birth or death: under the new law, only a Judicial Magistrate of the First Class can issue the registration order — a meaningfully higher bar than the executive-magistrate route that previously applied. Since a birth or death certificate serves as admissible evidence for proving the event in legal proceedings, this change effectively adds a layer of judicial scrutiny before very old, unregistered events can be formally recorded.

Why The Government Is Doing This

The stated goal, per the government, is to encourage timely reporting of births and deaths rather than leaving gaps that get patched up years later. This isn’t the first tightening of these rules — the Act’s predecessor amendment took effect on the same date, October 1, back in 2023, when it introduced the requirement for a national births-and-deaths database maintained by the Registrar General, with state Chief Registrars and Registrars obligated to feed data into it. The 2026 amendment builds directly on that framework, making the penalty for delay steeper rather than introducing an entirely new system.

For all the latest updates, download PGurus App.