MARGAO
Birth and death certificates are no longer being issued by the Margao Municipal Council in the New Year at the click of a mouse. In fact, hundreds of applicants have now realized the bitter truth that they are now forced to come back the following day, or sometimes even on the third day just to collect their birth certificates, owing to a huge backlog of pending applications.
In fact, strange it may sound, but true, that perhaps for the first time in recent years, applicants now cannot obtain their birth certificates within minutes, or on the same day for want of adequate staff to sign the certificates.
When The Goan contacted MMC Chairperson Babita Angle Prabhudessai to shed light on the complaints, she conceded that the certificates cannot be issued on the same day since the staff is bogged down in clearing a huge backlog of certificates.
“There’s a huge backlog of certificates awaiting signatures from the officials concerned. Since it was a year-end, many of the employees had proceeded on leave, throwing the system haywire. We are trying hard to clear the backlog. The system should return to normalcy within a week’s time,” Babita said.
City-based activist Laurel Abranches on Tuesday complained with the Chief Officer about the malfunctioning of the births and deaths record department, that has put applicants in great hardship.
“I was shocked when I came to the civic body to collect my child’s birth certificate. I was given a receipt and later told to come and collect the certificate on the third day. This is shocking. This has never happened in the past,” Laurel
pointed out. The activist also termed the situation as nothing but harassment meted out to the public., Laurel said that people stand in a queue after paying the prescribed fees, while adding further that a working person will have to apply for leave at his or her work place just to come and collect the certificate.
