Says no NOC needed from former husband; directs registration within a week
MARGAO
In a significant judgement, the High Court has asserted that the Civil Registrars have no powers to call upon the parties contracting a marriage to file no objections from their ex-spouses to the use of their ex-spouses’ surname.
Directing the Civil Registrar at Salcete, Margao, to register the marriage of the petitioners – a Russian woman and a man hailing from Colva – with the name of Petitioner No.1 as it is stated on her passport, the High Court has further held that Civil Registrars are not vested with powers to refuse registration of a civil marriage using the provisions of Article 43 to claim there is such an embargo on the use of an ex-spouse’s surname.
In the instant case, Petitioner No.1 is a Russian citizen as reflected in her passport. Her earlier marriage to a Russian national was dissolved in 2012, though she continues to use her ex-husband’s surname on all her official documents, including her passport.
When the petitioner initiated the online process of registration of marriage on the Goa Marriage Portal (National Generic Document Registration System – NGDRS) before the Civil Registrar, Margao, the Civil Registrar raised an objection that Petitioner No.1 cannot continue to use the surname of her former husband and must revert to her maiden surname as reflected in her birth certificate.
The Registrar maintained that the marriage could not be registered, despite orders of the Civil Court under Article 248, since Petitioner No.1 continued to use the surname of her ex-husband on her passport. The Registrar raised this objection based on what the authority perceives as a prohibition on the use of her ex-husband’s name under Article 43 of the Portuguese Law of Civil Marriage applicable to the State of Goa.
The High Court observed that the Civil Registrar has transgressed the powers vested in the authority under the Code of Civil Registration in insisting that the marriage of Petitioner No.1 be registered using her maiden name.
“There is nothing in Article 43 that acts as a prohibition on a divorced spouse using the other spouse’s surname, and in this case, there is a divorce decree produced where there is no such prohibition or claim at the behest of the ex-husband of Petitioner No.1,” the court observed.
In fact, the High Court observed that the Civil Registrars have no powers to call upon the parties contracting a marriage to file no objections from their ex-spouses to the use of their ex-spouses’ surname. “So also, Civil Registrars are not vested with powers to refuse registration of a civil marriage using the provisions of Article 43 to claim there is such an embargo on the use of an ex-spouse’s surname,” the court said, adding that objections raised by the Civil Registrar at Salcete, Margao, are arbitrary and contrary to the law.
The High Court directed the Civil Registrar at Salcete, Margao, to register the marriage of the petitioners with the name of Petitioner No.1 as it is stated on her passport. In the event of uploading the form on the NGDRS portal, if Petitioner No.1 faces any technical difficulty due to a difference in her name between her passport and birth certificate, the National Informatics Centre (NIC) shall keep its portal open and accept the upload of the form with the name of Petitioner No.1 as it stands in her passport.
The court has further directed the Civil Registrar at Salcete, Margao, to complete the process of registration of marriage within a week of the passing of the order.
