In recent months, what might have remained an internal administrative audit of municipal record-keeping has been recast in Mumbai and across Maharashtra as a high-voltage political campaign against alleged “illegal Bangladeshis.” A series of announcements — suspension of civic officials, cancellation of hundreds of birth certificates, constitution of a Special Investigation Team, and sweeping retrospective scrutiny of records — has been presented as a decisive strike against document fraud. Yet the scale, tone, and targeting of these measures suggest that this is no routine bureaucratic correction. It reflects a deeper and more troubling shift: the transformation of a civil registration regime into a site of securitised governance, where identity documentation becomes entangled with migration politics and communal suspicion.
According to Mid-Day, the Maharashtra government, through Revenue Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule, announced stricter norms for issuing birth and death certificates, particularly targeting “foreign nationals residing illegally.” The move followed allegations — amplified by BJP leader Kirit Somaiya — that thousands of birth certificates had been “fraudulently issued to Bangladeshi nationals.” A Special Investigation Team (SIT) was constituted, and a three-tier verification process introduced for delayed applications. Criminal prosecution was promised for those submitting allegedly “fake” documents.
On its face, preventing document fraud is a legitimate administrative objective. However, the framing of the issue — repeatedly tethered to “illegal Bangladeshis” — suggests that what is unfolding is not merely procedural tightening, but a securitised response to migration anxieties. More than anything else, privileging ruling party (read BJP) presence or dominance in the exercise makes it already suspect given the shrill (and brazenly anti-minority tones) in the party’s sloganeering on the question.
From administrative reform to political theatre
Reporting by CNBC-TV18 details that the BJP-led Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation cancelled 237 allegedly fake birth certificates and registered eight FIRs. Mayor Ritu Tawde publicly warned –on the very day of her election as Mayor of Mumbai–of a crackdown on “illegal Bangladeshis,” linking document irregularities to encroachment drives and street vendor verification.
The rhetorical shift is telling. What began as an investigation into possible irregularities in ward-level issuance of certificates has evolved into a broader political narrative about infiltration, encroachment, and demographic anxiety. Opposition leaders, including Uddhav Thackeray, questioned whether immigration enforcement falls within the municipal corporation’s mandate — a point also noted in CNBC-TV18’s coverage. Under India’s constitutional scheme, immigration control is squarely within the Union’s domain. The municipal body’s sweeping pronouncements risk conflating administrative lapses with nationality-based suspicion.
The Times of India reported that suspended civic officials had issued birth certificates for children older than one year without court orders — clearly beyond their statutory authority. That administrative overreach requires accountability. But the same report also highlighted systemic issues: hospitals failing to submit birth details within 21 days, procedural ambiguity at the ward level, and the absence of a standard operating procedure. These institutional gaps complicate –and even lay bare–the over-simplistic narrative of organised “infiltration mafias.”
Legal obligations under the registration regime
As The Indian Express clarified, under the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, all births in civic, government, or private hospitals must be registered irrespective of nationality. This is not a discretionary welfare benefit — it is a statutory obligation tied to identity, dignity, and access to rights. The same report noted that adult applicants require background verification, but infants born in hospitals must be registered without regard to citizenship.
This distinction is critical. Birth registration is a matter of civil documentation, not immigration adjudication. Blurring the two risks undermining India’s obligations under domestic law and international human rights standards, including the child’s right to identity.
The state government’s resolution — reported by Hindustan Times — now prohibits issuance of birth certificates based solely on documents such as school-leaving certificates, Aadhaar cards, or PAN cards, and mandates police verification, talathi reports, and multi-level scrutiny for delayed applications. While greater scrutiny for delayed registrations may be justified in cases of demonstrable fraud, the cumulative effect of police involvement, publication requirements, and criminal prosecution threatens to convert a civil registration process into a quasi-criminal proceeding.
The risk of overreach and chilling effects
Sweeping reviews of all birth records since 2016, as reported by The Indian Express, represent an extraordinary administrative exercise. Such retrospective scrutiny risks casting suspicion over entire communities, particularly those already subject to profiling. The political language accompanying the drive — references to “mafia raj,” “infiltrators,” and demographic threat — compounds that risk.
In constitutional democracies, administrative reform must be proportionate and evidence-based. If specific officers exceeded their authority or accepted forged hospital documentation, targeted disciplinary and criminal action is appropriate. But when enforcement rhetoric singles out a nationality or ethnic category, it veers toward collective suspicion.
There is also a structural danger here: by insisting on police verification and multiple layers of approval for delayed registrations, the state may inadvertently make birth registration inaccessible to vulnerable populations — including internal migrants, the urban poor, and those born outside formal medical settings. The more onerous the process, the greater the incentive to remain undocumented — a perverse outcome for a system ostensibly designed to ensure accurate records.
Most critically, such subjective and selective pressures over what must be a routine and compulsory exercise, runs the risk of pushing Mumbai and Maharashtra back on registration compliance. India has not yet reached a 100 per cent mark in birth registration. Besides as UNICEF tells us “Birth registration is an essential prerequisite for legal identity and the fulfilment of children’s rights. By registering children at birth and providing a birth certificate – a passport to lifelong protection – their exposure to rights violations are minimized and their access to essential services are enabled.” Moreover, a “Functioning civil registration systems are the main vehicles through which a legal identity for all can be achieved. Such systems produce vital statistics, including those on birth registration, which are foundational for achieving sustained human and economic development. While most countries have mechanisms in place for registering births, systematic recording remains a serious challenge, highlighting the urgent need to improve and strengthen civil registration and vital statistics.”
Governance failure reframed as security crisis
Several media reports note technical glitches in the central registration portal and backlog accumulation during certain periods. Administrative dysfunction, however, is being reframed as evidence of organised foreign infiltration. This shift deflects attention from institutional reform toward securitised spectacle.
If undocumented migration is indeed a pressing concern, the responsibility for border management lies with the Union government. Municipal cancellation of certificates does not resolve border control failures. It cannot be ignored that the political spotlight on alleged “illegal Bangladeshis” coincides with the BJP’s control of the civic body — raising questions about whether document fraud is being instrumentalised as a governance narrative.
The constitutional stakes
Birth certificates are foundational identity documents. They enable access to education, healthcare, property rights, and citizenship documentation. When the state transforms their issuance into a policing exercise infused with demographic suspicion, it risks eroding procedural fairness and equal protection.
Fraud must be investigated. Officials who acted beyond their statutory authority must face consequences. But the line between lawful scrutiny and discriminatory overreach is thin — and easily crossed when political messaging foregrounds nationality rather than administrative integrity.
The current measures in Maharashtra, as reflected across reporting by press and media mentioned above, reveal more than a crackdown on paperwork irregularities. They illustrate how bureaucratic processes can become sites of political contestation — and how civil documentation regimes, if weaponised, can deepen rather than resolve anxieties around migration and belonging.
In the long term, the integrity of the registration system will depend not on securitised rhetoric, but on transparent procedures, clear statutory limits, accountability mechanisms, and a firm commitment to non-discrimination. Without these safeguards, the tightening of norms risks tightening something far more fragile: the constitutional promise of equal protection under law.
Related:
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Former MP Kirit Somaiya labels Mumbai’s Muslim community as ‘Bangladeshi’
Deported in Silence: India’s mass expulsions of alleged Bangladeshis without due process