The mistake only came to light 12 years later when she went to the Shah Alam National Registration Department to apply for her identity card.

That marked the beginning of her problems. The NRD officer required the presence of her mother to rectify the mistake.

But Gomarthy's mother had left the family when she was 11 and could not be contacted.

She spent the next six years pleading her case with the NRD without success.
Help eventually came from the "Birth Certificate Registration Programme" organised by the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry.

With the assistance of one of the co-organisers of the Yayasan Strategik Sosial (YSS), Gomarthy, now 18, obtained a new birth certificate last week and applied for her IC.

"Because of this problem, I had to stop schooling in Form Three. If only it was settled years ago."

YSS assistant director V. Vanita Ramany criticised the NRD for the delay in correcting the mistake in Gomarthy's birth certificate.

"Why did they ask her to bring her mother who went missing years ago when her biological father was with her?"

Vanita said about 200 stateless people attended the programme held in Setapak, of which 87 were those without birth certificates, while the rest held red identity cards or had no identification papers.

A similar programme would be carried out in Raub, Pahang next month.

She said a child born in an unregistered marriage might not get a birth certificate as some NRD officers would register a child in the absence of the parents' marriage certificate while others would not.

She cited a case where seven brothers and sisters, aged 4 months to 10 years, did not have birth certificates because their parents did not register their marriage as it was the woman's second marriage.

Then there are married women without birth certificates.

In such cases, even if their children were to get their birth certificates, they would remain non-citizens, Vanita said.

She called for the appointment of more Tamil-speaking officers at NRD offices to help Indians who only spoke their mother tongue.

New Straits Times/Asia News Network