Telangana Introduces Family Register Certificate to Ease Documentation

After Karnataka’s move to issue Permanent Residence Certificates as a means to ease documentation amidst the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, the Congress government in neighbouring Telangana has introduced a Telangana Family Register and Family Register Certificate (FRC) as “an authenticated and reliable record of family composition”. In an order issued on July 25, the Revenue Department said the FRCs will be maintained electronically using data sourced from the Food Security Card database of ration card holders. The register will contain details such as the family’s ration card number — which will also serve as the Family Register Identification Number — along with the names of family members, their relationship to the head of the family, age, date of birth, gender, Aadhaar details and residential address. Like Permanent Residence Certificate, ‘Family Register’ is a document listed by the Election Commission (EC) as one of the 12 that can be produced during the SIR exercise to be included in the electoral rolls. The BJP has opposed the Revanth Reddy government’s move, with its Telangana chief N Ramchander Rao accusing the Congress regime of trying “to protect its illegal vote bank” as the SIR exercise seeks to filter out names. The party has raised similar objections to the Karnataka government’s PRC move. “The Congress, Bharat Rashtra Samithi and AIMIM, which have sheltered illegal vote banks for decades, can now see their political death warrant in the SIR. That is why the Congress government is rushing to issue FRCs, which is completely illegal,” Rao said in a post on X on Tuesday. Defending the FRC, adviser to the Telangana government Mohammed Ali Shabbir called it “a significant citizen-centric reform that would reduce documentation-related hardships faced by poor and economically weaker sections”. Shabbir had earlier urged the Chief Minister to introduce a Permanent Residence Certificate on the lines of Karnataka, arguing that residents need a government-issued proof of domicile that could be used for official purposes, including electoral verification. AIMIM president and Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi has also welcomed the Telangana government’s decision. According to the July 25 order by the Reddy government, the FRC would be “a record of the composition of the family as reflected in the source database”. “It shall not by itself confer, create, extinguish or determine any right, title or interest in any property, nor shall it be construed as a determination of legal heirship. Further, it does not confer any right for any claim for benefit under government schemes.” The order further said that any citizen could apply for a copy of the FRC pertaining to their family, by sharing their ration card number and paying a fee. “Only a member of the family whose particulars are borne in the register, being a major, shall be eligible to apply for a copy of the register of that family.” District Collectors are meant to oversee the implementation of the move.