Goa govt introduces a bill to crack down on name changes
The Goa government has introduced a bill in the state assembly debarring people from outside the state or people whose parents and grandparents were not born in Goa from changing their names — a move brought about by increasing frauds in land deals, and revelations that non- Goans were adopting Goan surnames in a bid to seek Portuguese citizenship, a facility available to Goans.
Introducing the Goa Change of Name (Amendment) Bill, 2022 in the state assembly, Goa law minister Nilesh Cabral said the law was being passed to streamline the process of name changes in view of several controversial instances in which people were found to be adopting Goan surnames completely unrelated to their original name.
“The bill provides for creation of the document which is of significant importance... hence it is imperative that the functions under the said Act be administered by the Judicial Officers,” the government said in its statement before the house.
The bill also mandated that any change in name will now have to be done through a civil judge as against a civil registrar.
The existing law says that “any person” who wishes to change his/her name or surname or both as recorded in the birth register will have to apply to the registrar to take the process forward. The proposed amendment says that only those people who are “born and whose birth is registered in Goa, and whose parents (at least one of them) or grandparents (at least one) were born in Goa” will be allowed to apply for a name change. The amendment was drafted after a petition was filed before the Goa bench of the Bombay high court , challenging the provisions of the existing law, in which, anyone was allowed to change their name to something completely unrelated to their own.
“In the absence of such safeguards, such name changes are being carried out with impunity and these persons get a new identity – often merrily changing name without changing religion and most often, acquiring Christian names... appears to be a racket to obtain Portuguese citizenship...” Viriato Fernandes, who filed the petition, said.
Under Portuguese law, those born in its erstwhile colonies before liberation, can get the country’s citizenship, and this facility is available till the third generation. In case of Goa, all those born before 1961 and their descendants are eligible.
Fernandes said the name change has also led to fraudulent real estate deals, with properties.
Goa chief minister Pramod Sawant on June 16 announced the creation a special investigation team (SIT) to probe fraudulent land deals, some of which were effected by showing a person as a descendant of the land owner by changing one’s name. So far, the SIT has detected 92 fraudulent land deals.