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News Title ’84 widow waits 26 yrs for death certificate
News Contents Twenty-six years ago, as Amritsar college teacher Narinderjit Singh left home for Ahmedabad, he promised Kiranjit, his wife of less than a year, that he would be back soon. That was on October 31, 1984. Narinderjit could not keep his promise. He disappeared the day after, probably killed by a mob at Bijwasan railway station in the wake of Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Kiranjit, then around 25 and the mother of a month-old baby boy, heard the news on the radio and rushed to Delhi. But in the piles of bodies, many no longer recognizable, she couldn’t find Narinderjit. She told herself he wasn’t dead, that he would suddenly turn up some day. He never did, though, and with time, Kiranjit reconciled herself to the fact that she had been left alone to bring up their son. Only the government refused to accept this. For a full quarter century, Kiranjit ran between government offices and courtrooms in Delhi and Punjab, trying to procure a certificate of her husband’s death, which would entitle her to some state benefits. A shocked Delhi High Court has now ordered the government to release the certificate to her in the next six weeks. “It is emphasized that since the petitioner has been awaiting the relief for over two decades, there should be no further delay beyond six weeks in issuing the death certificate,” Justice S Muralidhar directed the sub-divisional magistrate (SDM), Vasant Vihar. Kiranjit, who filed the petition through advocate Varun Goswami, told The Indian Express: “Widows are one of the most vulnerable sections of society. From being a homemaker, I suddenly had to become breadwinner.” The Punjab government gave Kiranjit a job, but could not give her husband’s death certificate, which could have helped her son in education and health. The Railway Police took around four years to declare Narinderjit missing, and possibly dead in the carnage. Kiranjit approached the deputy commissioner, Gurdaspur, to release the death certificate, but was asked to go to Delhi. In 1990, Kiranjit applied to the concerned deputy commissioner in Delhi. Six years later, in 1996, she was directed to the SDM of the Punjabi Bagh area. The SDM’s office told her the certificate could be issued only in Punjab, where the couple were resident. So in 1997, Kiranjit returned to the Gurdaspur office. She waited 10 years, and when nothing came out of it, in 2007, she filed a writ petition in the Punjab and Haryana High Court. She was directed to approach the concerned authorities first. She came back to Delhi and made yet another representation to the Punjabi Bagh SDM’s office, which told her again to return to Punjab. So in 2008, she filed a second petition in the High Court. This time the court directed the SDM, Gurdaspur, to decide on her request within four weeks. Punjab’s Department of Relief and Resettlement however asked her to approach the SDM in Delhi. Kiranjit then filed yet another petition in the High Court. The court asked her to approach the concerned authorities in Delhi. In December 2009, Kiranjit filed a petition in the Delhi High Court seeking a directive to the authorities to release the death certificate. --Indian express
 




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