CBSE can’t deny name change: High Court
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, February 4
The Punjab and Haryana High Court has made it clear that a person can get his name changed in the certificates of secondary and senior secondary school examination, although the CBSE rules permit correction only in case of clerical or typographical errors.
“If the rules do not cater for a particular situation, a constitutional court can always issue directions to fill the void,” Justice Sudhir Mittal of the High Court ruled. The assertion came on a petition filed by Satish Kumar, aka Shrey, against the Central Board of Secondary Education and another respondent.
The Bench during the course of hearing was told that the petitioner passed his secondary school examination in 2014 and his name in the certificate was recorded as “Satish Kumar”. But his father in 2016 decided to change his name to “Shrey”.
Accordingly, an advertisement was published in two local newspapers and a declaration was carried in a gazette dated July 1, 2016. Pursuant to the procedure, the petitioner’s name was recorded as “Shrey” in his Aadhaar and PAN card.
A request was made to the CBSE’s regional officer to correct the name in the secondary school examination certificate in January 2018. But the same was not done, compelling the petitioner to file the writ petition.
CBSE’s counsel submitted that only a clerical/typographical error in the name could be corrected according to the rules. “There is no provision permitting change in name and thus, the writ petition deserves dismissal,” he added.
After hearing the arguments and going through the documents, Justice Mittal asserted: “The name of a person is a personal choice. It identifies the person, but is not in the nature of an identification card which can never be changed. An individual is free to change his name any time so long as the process provided thereof has been followed.”
