SDMC to fix technical glitch, tweak notification sent out for death certificate

The Leader of the House in SDMC, Narendra Chawla, directed the officials of public health department to change the content of these messages and also ensure that they are not delivered to the wrong people

The South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) is likely to change the format of messages sent to phone numbers registered for death certificate. The civic body’s standing committee has given directions in this regard after Aya Nagar councillor Ved Pal raised the issue of an erroneous message sent to a resident in his ward.

Representational Image. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Pal said that a resident in his constituency received a message saying, “Your request for death registration has been approved”. “The person who received this message was shocked. He has never applied for anyone’s death certificate. Later, after checking with the SDMC authorities, we found out that it was wrongly sent. But still, the language of the text could have been different... It should be changed,” Pal said.

Senior SDMC officials insisted that the text message was “wrongly delivered” due to some technical glitches in the system.

However, after Pal raised the issue in the standing committee meeting on Monday, the Leader of the House in SDMC, Narendra Chawla, directed the officials of public health department to change the content of these messages and also ensure that they are not delivered to the wrong people.

“We have asked the department to change the format and include the name of the deceased and the person who has applied for the death certificate. The language of the message, which was sent to the wrong person, was also such as if he/she had applied for the certificate,” Chawla said.

He added that the department has also been asked to make its system of application for and downloading of various certificates more user friendly.