A person barely requires any attestation unless there is any requirement. Mostly, it is required in the case immigration documentation procedures. Most of the people feel the urgency to get them apostilled or attested when the authority requests.
Significance of Attestation of Birth Certificate (BC)
Any document is invalid unless it is verified and legalized. The concerned authority puts the stamp and signature on it to make it acceptable legitimately. There are legislations in all countries that necessitate legalizing important documents.
For instance, the Hague Convention (1960) member countries agree to apostille documents before emigrating.
Every country comes with its unique legalizing authorities. They define different types of attestation. Birth certificate attestation is mandatory to be accepted legally anywhere.
Types of Attestation of Documents
Here are the most common types of attestations:
- Notary Attestation
It is the elementary level legalization. Every country’s jurisdiction has a notary public as a legal authority to verify and authenticate the document like birth proof.
- Civil Office Attestation
This is concerned with the state or district level attestation. is related to the authentication of personal documents, like a death certificate, birth certificate, marriage certificate, etc.
- Sub-divisional Magistrate (SDM) Attestation
This type can be replaced with the civil authority attestation. There are some cases of unregistered birth. For them, an affidavit is required as a proof to apply for the birth certificate. The SDM or Magistrate stamps it and puts his signature on the paper. This is done upon verifying school certificate or other birth proofs.
- Ministry of External Affairs Attestation
Every country has a foreign ministry that looks into the document matter of the foreigners also. It authenticates that the birth proof is valid and genuine. Once attested, the applicant becomes able to emigrate.
It is an alternative of the foreign ministry attestation. The applicant can get it if he is likely to visit any of the member countries of the Hague Convention. This is done during an interview, which is conducted formally to know the interest and intentions of the person.
- Embassy Attestation
This is the last step of legalizing the birth proof. The individual has to fix an appointment with the foreign embassy where he/she is likely to go and go through verification procedure. Once done, the person can easily go abroad.
* These types of legalization are required in the case of immigration. The birth proof attestation requires verification from the local authority or SDM only.
Process of Attestation
The person has to get through all steps of legalization of the birth certificate. The aforementioned authorities are sequentially defined to go through. The applicant has to follow that hierarchy and get it attested.
Here, one should take into account that the unregistered birth can be registered. In this case, the process begins from getting an affidavit from the local court and get it attested from the SDM or magistrate. Any A-gazette officer may also verify it because it is acceptable according to legislation.
Thereafter, the local civil authority, foreign ministry or the union government office would be the next levels where you need to go for legalizing your document.
At the end, foreign embassy would put its stamp for emigration.
While doing so, the first and second level authorities would strictly check the details before putting their stamps and signature.
Checklist of Supporting Documents
- Passport Copy
- Visa Copy
- Mark Sheet/School Leaving Certificate
- ID Proof, that can be PAN card, Ration Card, Driving Licence, Nationality Card
- Address Proof, like Electricity Bill, Water Bill, Bank Passbook
- Letter from hospital or the witness of birth
- Affidavit of your mother/father/ uncle/ aunt/ elder brother or sister, which is a sworn document stating the appropriate birth place, date, year and time
Summary
The attestation of birth certificate defined that the document is legal and genuine. There are multiple types of attestations, which start with notary public, SDM or state level, foreign ministry and then, embassy. All of these attestations are required if one is likely to visit a foreign country. Otherwise, just local authority attestation is enough.