Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC) has uncovered a racket involved in issuing fake birth and death certificates online for as little as ₹20. The fraud came to light when a woman from Kolar approached the BMC office to correct the surname on her son’s birth certificate.

Vishal Prajapati, the staffer at the BMC’s birth-death registry counter, noticed discrepancies in the document. Although the certificate appeared authentic, a scan on the government portal revealed that the record didn’t exist in official data. On deeper investigation, officials discovered that the certificate had been generated from a fake website designed to mimic the official portal.

The BMC has filed an FIR at the Govindpura police station and also lodged a formal complaint in the city crime branch suspecting that several such fraudulent certificates may already be in circulation.

Officials warned the public against engaging brokers, asking them to apply only through the official government portal to ensure authenticity. The case is now under police investigation, and further action is expected against those involved in creating and circulating these forged documents.

Satyaprakash Badgainya, registrar of BMC’s birth-death certificate branch, stated that even the digital signature on the certificate was identical to the original, raising serious concerns about cyber forgery. Alarmingly, the fake site did not require any document verification and the users could simply pay ₹20 online and instantly receive a certificate.

How to differentiate between real and fake websites?

• Government’s official website ends with “gov.in” but this particular website ends with “gov.in-crs.org”.

• Every official online certificate will consist of “Registration Unit Name” and “Registration Unit Code”.  

• Also every Registration Unit Code will be unique and different.