Some hurdles for Goans to overcome while obtaining Portuguese Nationality in 2006 

Livia de Abreu Noronha

TGF :[ This post was apparently sent to GoaNet, the allegedly "premiere" Goan mailing list on February 22, 2006.  TGF is uncertain IF this post was posted on GoaNet or just dumped. If and When TGF locates the post on GoaNet, it will give due credit to GoaNet. Until that time, here is a post which TGF thinks is quite important.]

Passports issued by the Indian authorities do not appear to comply with the international rules, as far as the limited required data is concerned. I myself had an experience when I accompanied someone to one of the "Conservatorias de Registo Civil" as a witness to some act. As the officers were preparing the draft, I heard something like "laite so and so and laite so and so". I was forced to interrupt them that "late" was not part of the name of the parents of the concerned party but it meant what in Portuguese we would say " finado". What is the importance of this status in a travel document, specially when the person is an adult?

How can the Portuguese authorities ever understand that in India they still issue documents with the surnames in the first place when even its colonial fathers, from whom India inherited this system no longer use it?

Why won't the passport issuing office issue passports showing names as they appear on the birth certificates ?

I have seen first names as "Cruz" in Goa. Cruz in Portugal is a surname. So such little details which may otherwise not be important, must absolutely be cleared before a person can have the "Transcrição de Nascimento" and "Atribuição de Nacionalidade" carried out in Portugal.

I know that in India names are changed by advertising in the papers but in Portugal, one has to apply to the Law Ministry, give absolutely valid reasons for the change, and it is a lengthy process.

One keeps complaining about the delays that occur in the Registos Centrais but if one is to analyze the documents submitted one cannot but get a surprise.

That is how "Indian dead men can fly".

Just to mention a fresh case that is currently in my hands. I have just obtained a birth certificate of a person whose file refers to 1996 - the year the file was initiated with the submission of a baptism certificate.  After that the authorities stopped accepting  baptism certificates because these do not show the place of birth, and started asking for birth certificates issued by civil authorities, which in the case of Bombay  happens to be the Municipal Corporation of Greater Bombay .

Every one knows that the Indian authorities are not very "famous" for writing the litany of western names, which is a must for the birth records in Portugal, including the father's surname. Well this registration of birth to which I am referring to with the "atribuição de nacionalidade" has three endorsements as follows:(1) Gives the place of birth of the parents, their age and their civil status and gives the full names of both maternal and paternal grandparents.(2) Rectifies the names of the parents by inserting the whole litany of parents' names as they are in their own original birth certificates taken from records pre 1961 from Goan registrar's offices and not incomplete and "translated into English" as they appear in the certificate issued by the Municipality. (3) Attributes the Portuguese Nationality as per law 37/85 and fixes the name by adding the surname. No surname was indicated in the Municipal certificate. The Municipal certificate was only submitted in 1999 three years after the opening of the file!!!! The front page of the birth certificate has no use except for the date of birth and all the other details, for issuing of "Bilhete de Identidade" or for the purpose of inheritance, etc. have to be taken from the reverse of the document. We complain of bureaucracy, this and that, but it is the identity of a person that is involved and cannot be treated lightly as is done in India.

Then, there is the instance of a person who filed her papers in Lisbon in 2001, and was later asked to produce a document issued by authorities of "Antigo Estado da India".

As she was born in Bombay and registered in due course in Goa, the "Posto do Registo Civil" that registered her says that she was born in "bairro: Byculla" and "freguesia de N.S. da Gloria" .

No doubt that the Portuguese authorities should know the geography of "Estado da India" but are they expected to know the the geography of India?

No doubt that the document was issued by the Portuguese authorities and therefore it has to be accepted, but to make everything clear they have to send it to the Portuguese Consulate in Goa for the sake of clarification. This file was started early 2001 and bears the number 8000 something and according to the interview in the Goan Observer, conducted by Devika Sequeira, given by the Portuguese Consul General in Goa, there are 12000 applications and another such number is on the way, so no doubt, it is time consuming, and every document is being scrutinized with a magnifying glass and therefore all interested parties should keep on pressing the Conservatoria dos Registos Centrais by continuously or constantly asking for information on their files so that they may be rolling up and down and don't remain at the bottom of the trays. This is my sincere advice to one and all - and is based on my own experience.

Best of luck to all the Goans who are anxious to get through this ordeal, which should have really been a smooth one, "punn bhaile lokhan piddar konn ghallem". As a Catholic I will say "Devan tumkam sogleank adhar dinvum".



Livia de Abreu Noronha
March 5, 2006

other articles related to Portuguese Nationality

Paulo Colaco Dias: Applying for Portuguese Nationality

Chandrakant Keni:   Expel Goans with Portuguese Nationality

Portugal Official Nationality Site  - has mirror site in English