Court Marriage Registration in Delhi

“Court Marriage Registration” Means Two Different Things, and Nobody Tells You Which One You Are Buying

This is the phrase people actually type, and it is the phrase that causes the most expensive confusion in this business. In Delhi it is used for two completely separate legal operations, under two different Acts, producing two certificates that do not carry the same weight in law.

The first thing it means is this. You had a wedding — Arya Samaj rites, a family ceremony, a temple, a gurdwara, a wedding in your village twelve years ago — and now you want the government to have a record of it. That is registration under the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, section 8, and it is what the overwhelming majority of people who use this phrase actually want. No notice. No waiting period. Our marriage registration page and our SDM page cover that route properly.

The second thing it means is a marriage done entirely through the State, with no religious ceremony at all — two people signing before a Marriage Officer with three witnesses, under the Special Marriage Act, 1954, after a notice that sits open for thirty days. That is the route our court marriage page sets out.

And then there is a third thing, which almost nobody knows exists, and which is the reason this page was written.

A couple who are already married by a religious ceremony can register that existing marriage under the Special Marriage Act instead of under the Hindu Marriage Act. Not marry again. Register the marriage they already have, under the other Act, down a route called Chapter III.

The certificate that comes out of that route is a different animal from the one that comes out of a Hindu Marriage Act registration, and the difference is written into the statute in two words.

Under the Hindu Marriage Act, section 8(4), the register is “admissible as evidence”.

Under the Special Marriage Act, section 13(2), the certificate is “conclusive evidence”.

Those are not two ways of saying the same thing. They are two different levels of proof, and the gap between them is the whole subject of this page.

But the Chapter III route is not free, and this page is going to be equally plain about the price of it: a thirty-day public notice applies even though you are already married; both of you must have completed twenty-one, which rules out a great many couples who could register under the Hindu Marriage Act today; three witnesses are needed rather than two; and for some couples it changes which law governs inheritance in their family.

So this page does one job: it sets the three routes side by side, quotes what each one actually produces, and lets you choose with the statute in front of you instead of being sold whichever one the person on the phone prefers to sell.

Read This First: What We Are and What We Are Not

This page compares statutory routes and quotes evidentiary provisions, so the boundary goes at the top, not the bottom.

What this office does is two things: the Arya Samaj ceremony is performed here, and marriages are entered on the government register. That is the whole of it.

Legal practice is not something anybody here does. No person at this office stands up in a courtroom, lodges proceedings, prepares pleadings or represents a soul anywhere. Nor are we a court, nor a Marriage Officer, nor holders of a single power handed down by either of them — and no private organisation in this country is, so treat anybody hinting at the contrary as somebody already working against your interest.

We do not advise on succession, inheritance or property, and that matters specifically on this page, because one of the routes compared below has succession consequences. We set out what the sections say. We do not tell you what they mean for your family's property, and we are not the people to ask. No estates, no succession certificates, no letters of administration, no probate, no partition. None of it is charged for because none of it is done here.

We do not tell you which route to take. We tell you what each one costs, what each one requires, how long each one takes, and what each one produces. The choice is a decision about your own privacy, your own family and your own timing, and it is not ours to make.

We do not supply witnesses — which matters more on this page than most, because the Special Marriage Act route needs three of them rather than two. There is no figure at which this office provides one.

We do not perform or register a marriage for anybody below the legal age, at any price, under any pressure, with no exception and no further discussion.

We do not write a date for a ceremony that did not happen, which also matters more here than elsewhere: the Chapter III route asks you to state that a ceremony was performed and that you have been living together as husband and wife ever since. That is a statement of fact in a government record, and we will not help anybody make a false one.

And we suggest, arrange, require and facilitate nobody's conversion to anything. One of the honest attractions of the Special Marriage Act is that it never asks about anybody's religion in the first place.

“Conclusive Evidence” — Two Words That Are Not Decoration

Start with what the Special Marriage Act route produces, because it is the strongest thing any of these routes produces and almost nobody selling it can tell you why.

Section 13(1) sets up the book:

“When the marriage has been solemnized, the Marriage Officer shall enter a certificate thereof in the form specified in the Fourth Schedule in a book to be kept by him for that purpose and to be called the Marriage Certificate Book and such certificate shall be signed by the parties to the marriage and the three witnesses.”

And then section 13(2), which is the sentence this page is built on:

“On a certificate being entered in the Marriage Certificate Book by the Marriage Officer, the Certificate shall be deemed to be conclusive evidence of the fact that a marriage under this Act has been solemnized and that all formalities respecting the signatures of witnesses have been complied with.”

Now put that next to what the Hindu Marriage Act says about its own register, in section 8(4):

“The Hindu Marriage Register shall at all reasonable times be open for inspection, and shall be admissible as evidence of the statements therein contained…”

Read the two phrases together, because the difference is the entire commercial and legal case for the harder route.

“Admissible as evidence” means the document is allowed in. It can be produced, it will be looked at, and it counts. It does not mean the matter is closed. Somebody who wants to dispute what the register says is free to try, and the register is a piece of material in that argument rather than the end of it.

“Conclusive evidence” is a different instruction to a court altogether. Where a statute declares something conclusive evidence of a fact, the court is directed to treat that fact as established. The argument does not get had.

And notice exactly what section 13(2) is conclusive of, because this is where honest explanation stops and sales talk begins. It is conclusive evidence of two specific things: that a marriage under this Act has been solemnised, and that the formalities about the witnesses' signatures were complied with.

It is not a certificate of good character, it does not make a marriage valid that was void for some other reason, and it is not conclusive of anything beyond those two matters. Anybody who tells you a Special Marriage Act certificate makes your marriage unchallengeable on every ground is overselling it, and section 24 — which we come to further down — is the proof that they are.

But within its own limits it is the strongest statement any of these documents carries, and our Arya Samaj mandir page sets out the other end of the same spectrum: a mandir's own register, which no statute declares to be evidence of anything at all.

Three documents, three levels, and it is worth holding them in your head in this order: a mandir certificate, which proves a ceremony and depends on a private institution; a Hindu Marriage Act entry, which the statute makes admissible evidence and which the State keeps; and a Special Marriage Act certificate, which the statute makes conclusive evidence of solemnisation. Each step up costs something, and the next three sections are about what Chapter III costs.

Chapter III: Registering the Marriage You Already Have, Under the Other Act

The route almost nobody is told about sits in Chapter III of the Special Marriage Act, headed Registration of Marriages Celebrated in Other Forms. Section 15 opens it, and it is worth reading slowly because every clause in it is a gate.

“Any marriage celebrated, whether before or after the commencement of this Act, other than a marriage solemnized under the Special Marriage Act, 1872, or under this Act, may be registered under this Chapter by a Marriage Officer in the territories to which this Act extends if the following conditions are fulfilled, namely:—

(a) a ceremony of marriage has been performed between the parties and they have been living together as husband and wife ever since;

(b) neither party has at the time of registration more than one spouse living;

(c) neither party is an idiot or a lunatic at the time of registration;

(d) the parties have completed the age of twenty-one years at the time of registration;

(e) the parties are not within the degrees of prohibited relationship.”

Six things follow from that section, and five of them are things people are not told.

One — the route exists at all, and it is open to a marriage from any year. “Whether before or after the commencement of this Act”. A wedding in 1989 is inside this section exactly as a wedding last month is.

Two — it does not care what the ceremony was. The words are “any marriage celebrated… other than” one already done under this Act or the 1872 Act. Arya Samaj rites, a temple wedding, a gurdwara, a church, a nikah, a village custom: the section asks only that “a ceremony of marriage has been performed”.

Three — clause (a) has a second half that people skim, and it is a continuing requirement. Not merely that a ceremony happened, but that the parties “have been living together as husband and wife ever since”. A couple who married and then lived apart for years do not obviously satisfy that clause, and whether a particular history satisfies it is a question for an advocate on the facts and emphatically not for us.

Four — clause (d) is the one that stops most couples, and it is not the age you are thinking of. It gets its own section below.

Five — the language of clause (c) is the Act's own. “Idiot or a lunatic” is how the statute reads; it is not language we would choose and we quote it only because paraphrasing a condition of registration would be worse than printing it.

Six — the section says the marriage may be registered, not shall. The conditions are gates, and the Marriage Officer has to be satisfied they are met.

The Age Nobody Mentions: Twenty-One, Both of You

This is the single most useful fact on this page and it costs us money to print, because it sends couples to the cheaper route.

Section 15(d): “the parties have completed the age of twenty-one years at the time of registration”.

Both parties. Twenty-one. At the time of registration.

Now compare the Hindu Marriage Act. Section 5(iii) sets the ages for a Hindu marriage at twenty-one for the bridegroom and eighteen for the bride. A couple who married validly under that Act — husband twenty-two, wife nineteen — can have their marriage entered on the Hindu Marriage Register today.

The same couple cannot use Chapter III of the Special Marriage Act, because she has not completed twenty-one.

Read that again, because it is counter-intuitive and it catches people constantly. The marriage is perfectly valid. Nobody is suggesting otherwise. She is lawfully married and lawfully a wife. What she cannot do is take this particular registration route until her twenty-first birthday, because the route sets its own floor and the floor is higher than the marriage age.

What that means practically, and we tell couples this on the telephone every week: if the wife is between eighteen and twenty-one, the Chapter III question does not arise at all this year. Register under the Hindu Marriage Act now — it is faster, cheaper, carries no notice and no waiting — and if the stronger certificate still matters to you later, the Chapter III route is not going anywhere, because section 15 covers a marriage from any year.

And a warning that belongs here rather than anywhere else. Because clause (d) is a condition of the registration itself, a couple who get past it by stating an age that is not true have not merely bent a form. Section 24(2), set out below, lets a registration obtained in contravention of clauses (a) to (e) be declared of no effect — so the document that was supposed to be the strongest one in the house becomes the weakest. We will not do it, and nobody should let anybody else do it for them.

Yes, There Is a Thirty-Day Notice on This Route Too

Here is the fact that changes most people's decision, and it is the one most consistently left out when this route is sold.

People assume the thirty-day notice is the price of a fresh court marriage — that it exists because the State wants a window before two strangers to each other's families are married. So they reason, understandably, that a couple already married for nine years cannot possibly need one.

They do. Section 16:

“Upon receipt of an application signed by both the parties to the marriage for the registration of their marriage under this Chapter the Marriage Officer shall give public notice thereof in such manner as may be prescribed and after allowing a period of thirty days for objections and after hearing any objection received within that period, shall, if satisfied that all the conditions mentioned in section 15 are fulfilled, enter a certificate of the marriage in the Marriage Certificate Book in the form specified in the Fifth Schedule, and such certificate shall be signed by the parties to the marriage and by three witnesses.”

Four things in that one sentence, and each of them is a practical consequence.

One — the application must be signed by both parties. This is not something one spouse arranges while the other is away.

Two — public notice, and then thirty days for objections. On an existing marriage. Of nine years' standing. With children. The notice goes up anyway.

Three — the Officer must hear any objection received inside that period and be satisfied the section 15 conditions are met before entering the certificate.

Four — three witnesses sign, not two. The Hindu Marriage Act route runs on two. Chapter III runs on three, and they sign the certificate itself.

Who does that notice matter to? We will put it plainly, because this is where an honest adviser earns their fee. For most settled couples it is a formality and thirty days is merely slow. For some it is not. A couple whose families never accepted the marriage, a couple who moved cities to get away from an argument, a household where a property dispute is live, a woman whose first marriage ended badly: for those households a public notice naming both of you, displayed for thirty days, is not a formality. It is an announcement.

And the Hindu Marriage Act route has no notice at all. That is the trade, stated as baldly as we can state it: the stronger certificate is bought with thirty days of visibility. If visibility is your problem, our love marriage page is written for exactly that situation, including what the notice contains and who sees it.

What the Entry Actually Does — Section 18

If you go through it, section 18 tells you what you have bought, and it is more than a certificate.

“Subject to the provisions contained in sub-section (2) of section 24, where a certificate of marriage has been finally entered in the Marriage Certificate Book under this Chapter, the marriage shall, as from the date of such entry, be deemed to be a marriage solemnized under this Act, and all children born after the date of the ceremony of marriage (whose names shall also be entered in the Marriage Certificate Book) shall in all respects be deemed to be and always to have been the legitimate children of their parents.”

Three things, and the second one is the part families care about most.

One — the marriage is thereafter treated as though it had been solemnised under the Special Marriage Act. It is not registered alongside that Act; it is brought inside it, from the date of the entry.

Two — the children. The section provides for the names of children born after the date of the ceremony to be entered in the Marriage Certificate Book, and declares them “deemed to be and always to have been the legitimate children of their parents”. Not legitimate from the date of registration. Always to have been. For a household that has spent years with nothing on paper and children in school, that is the clause worth knowing about.

Three — it opens with “subject to”, and what it is subject to is the trapdoor in the next section.

The Trapdoor: Section 24(2)

Any honest account of this route has to include the provision that can undo it, and it is the answer to anybody selling Chapter III as bulletproof.

Section 24(2), in the copies we read, provides in substance that nothing in that section about void marriages applies to a marriage deemed solemnised under the Act within the meaning of section 18 — but that the registration of such a marriage under Chapter III “may be declared to be of no effect if the registration was in contravention of any of the conditions specified in clauses (a) to (e) of section 15”.

So the two halves of this page meet here. Section 13(2) makes the certificate conclusive evidence that a marriage under the Act was solemnised. Section 24(2) lets the registration itself be declared of no effect where one of the five section 15 conditions was not actually satisfied.

Which is exactly why the five conditions are not paperwork. The continuing requirement in clause (a) that the parties have been living together as husband and wife ever since; the single-spouse requirement in (b); the twenty-one in (d); the prohibited-degrees bar in (e). Every one of those is a condition the registration can later be tested against.

And it is the reason this office will not help anybody state something that is not so on a Chapter III application. Not out of squeamishness. Because the entire point of taking the harder route is to end up holding the strongest document available, and a registration obtained in contravention of section 15 is a document built with the mechanism of its own undoing already inside it.

We are describing section 24(2) rather than quoting it whole, for a reason we would rather print than hide: it runs through a cross-reference and an exception and a compressed quotation of it would mislead. The words in quotation marks above are the Act's; the frame around them is our summary, and anybody who needs to rely on this provision needs an advocate and not our reading of it.

The Consequence That Frightens People, and Why for Most Couples Here It Disappears

Somebody will eventually tell you that a Special Marriage Act marriage “cuts you out of the family property”. That claim comes from two real sections, and then from a third section that almost nobody reads, which switches the first two off for a very large share of the couples who walk in here. We take all three.

Section 19:

“The marriage solemnized under this Act of any member of an undivided family who professes the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion shall be deemed to effect his severance from such family.”

Section 21:

“Notwithstanding any restrictions contained in the Indian Succession Act, 1925, with respect to its application to members of certain communities, succession to the property or any person whose marriage is solemnized under this Act and to the property of the issue of such marriage shall be regulated by the provisions of the said Act…”

Taken alone, those two sections are the basis of the warning: severance from an undivided family, and succession pulled over to the Indian Succession Act, 1925.

And now section 21A, inserted later, which is the part that gets left out:

“Where the marriage is solemnized under this Act of any person who professes the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion with a person who professes the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion, section 19 and section 21 shall not apply and so much of section 20 as creates a disability shall also not apply.”

Read the condition in it carefully, because it is a condition about both parties. Where one party professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion marries another party professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion — section 19 does not apply and section 21 does not apply.

Which produces the practical position that matters to most people reading this page. For a couple where both are Hindu — and that is the majority of couples who come to an Arya Samaj mandir — the severance in section 19 and the succession switch in section 21 are expressly turned off by section 21A. The warning they were given does not apply to them, and the person who gave it had read two sections out of three.

And equally plainly: where the two parties do not both fall inside that list, section 21A does not help them, and sections 19 and 21 are live. For a marriage between a Hindu and a Christian, a Hindu and a Muslim, a Hindu and a Parsi, or a Hindu and a person of no religion, this is a real consideration and not a rumour. Our inter-religion page and our court marriage page both deal with the route for those couples.

Now the limit on everything in this section, and we mean it as strictly as it reads. We have set out four sections. We have not told you what they do to your family's property, and we are not going to. Whether anybody is a member of an undivided family; what a severance does to a share; how the Indian Succession Act would distribute a particular estate; whether a particular person professes a particular religion within the meaning of section 21A; what any of it means for a house in a village or a shop in a market — every one of those is a question for an advocate on your facts, and several of them have been litigated for decades.

Succession, inheritance, estates, probate, partition and property are entirely outside this office and nobody here is paid a rupee for any of them. If property is the reason you are choosing between these routes, see an advocate before you choose, not after — and if you cannot afford one, any woman may have an advocate appointed free with her means never inquired into, which our Vikaspuri page sets out along with where legal aid stops.

The Three Routes, Side by Side

This is the table the whole page exists to put in front of you. Nothing in it is a recommendation.

	Hindu Marriage Act s.8 registration	Special Marriage Act, Chapter III (s.15–18)	Special Marriage Act, fresh marriage
Who it is for	A couple already married by Hindu rites who want the State's record of it	A couple already married by a ceremony in any form who want that marriage brought inside the Special Marriage Act	Two people who want to marry through the State with no religious ceremony at all
Public notice	None	Yes — s.16: public notice and “a period of thirty days for objections”, even on an old marriage	Yes — thirty days
Minimum ages	HMA s.5(iii): 21 and 18	s.15(d): 21 and 21, at the time of registration	21 and 21
Witnesses	Two	Three, signing the certificate — s.16	Three
What the document is in law	HMA s.8(4): the register is “admissible as evidence”	SMA s.13(2): the certificate is “conclusive evidence” that a marriage under the Act was solemnised and the witness formalities were met	Same — “conclusive evidence”
Effect on the marriage itself	None — HMA s.8(5): validity “shall in no way be affected by the omission to make the entry”	s.18: from the date of entry the marriage is “deemed to be a marriage solemnized under this Act”	It is the marriage
Children	Legitimacy does not depend on registration	s.18: names entered, and children “deemed to be and always to have been the legitimate children of their parents”	Ordinary position
Can it be undone later	Correction of an entry is an ordinary procedure	s.24(2): registration “may be declared to be of no effect” if it contravened any of s.15(a)–(e)	Ordinary grounds under the Act
Succession / undivided family	Untouched by the registration	ss.19 and 21 are live unless s.21A applies — and s.21A switches both off where both parties profess the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion	Same analysis
Old marriage eligible	Yes, no cut-off — any year	Yes — s.15: “whether before or after the commencement of this Act”, but s.15(a) requires living together as husband and wife ever since	Not applicable
Religion asked about	The Act applies to Hindus as it defines them	The section asks only that “a ceremony of marriage has been performed”	Open to any two persons — s.4
Our charge	₹6,000 for an earlier wedding; ₹7,100 with the ceremony	₹15,000 — the Special Marriage Act figure, because the work is the same notice-and-objection process	₹15,000

And the one-line version, for anybody who has read enough: the Hindu Marriage Act route is faster, cheaper, has no notice and no twenty-one-year floor; the Chapter III route buys you a certificate the statute calls conclusive evidence, and charges you thirty days of public notice, a higher age floor and a third witness for it.

One limit on every row above. This table compares what the two Acts say. It does not tell you which route your own facts qualify for, what any Marriage Officer will require, whether any particular history satisfies section 15(a), or what any of it means for anybody's property. Nothing in it is advice.

What Is Actually Asked For

The full list by route is on our documents page. What follows is what changes because of the route, which is the part nobody separates out.

Common to all three routes: identity proof and age proof for each of you, address proof for each of you, photographs, and the witnesses with their own identity and address papers.

Age proof matters more on the Chapter III route than anywhere else on this website, because section 15(d) makes twenty-one a condition of the registration itself and section 24(2) lets a registration that contravened it be declared of no effect. Bring the strongest age document the household has, not the most convenient one.

Proof that the ceremony happened. Section 15(a) requires that “a ceremony of marriage has been performed”. Whatever you have — a mandir certificate, photographs with both faces and the fire visible, the card, the priest's details — bring all of it. Our mandir certificate is exactly the kind of material that serves here, and this is the clearest answer on the whole site to “what is the mandir paper even for”.

And material going to the second half of clause (a) — living together as husband and wife ever since. A shared address across documents, children's school records naming both parents, a joint account, a ration or electricity record. We are not going to tell you what satisfies that clause; we are telling you which drawer to empty before you go.

If either of you was married before: the decree of divorce, or the former spouse's death certificate. Section 15(b) requires that neither party has “more than one spouse living” at the time of registration, and our remarriage page covers the sequence.

If one of you lives abroad or is a foreign national: say it in the first minute of the first call, because it changes the route, the documents and sometimes which Act applies. Our NRI page sets out how.

And bring every spelling. Each version of each name that appears on any paper you own. On this route the certificate is going to be described as conclusive evidence of something, so it had better carry the names your other documents carry.

Three Witnesses, Not Two

Both Special Marriage Act routes need three witnesses. The Hindu Marriage Act route needs two. It sounds like a detail and it is the single commonest reason a couple arrives and cannot be completed that day.

And on this route they sign the certificate itself. Section 13(1) requires that the certificate “be signed by the parties to the marriage and the three witnesses”, and section 16 says the same for a Chapter III certificate. Section 13(2) then makes that certificate conclusive evidence that the formalities about those signatures were complied with. So the three signatures are not ceremonial garnish — they are part of what the statute is declaring conclusive.

We do not supply any of the three, at any price, and an establishment that offers to produce them should be refused on the spot. A man who was never in the room cannot truthfully sign to say he was, and on a document the Act calls conclusive evidence, building in a defect on day one is a peculiarly bad idea. The person left holding it is you.

And the job itself is tiny, which is worth spelling out because people decline it out of a fear of something that was never on offer. Turning up and putting a signature where the officer indicates is the whole of it. No obligation is undertaken, nothing whatsoever is underwritten, neither of you becomes his responsibility, and realistically he will never hear about the matter again as long as he lives. Repeat those sentences to the uncle you are hesitating to telephone; the version in his head is far bigger than the version on the form.

What each brings: two papers of his own, issued to him personally — one carrying his photograph, one fixing where he lives.

Who to pick. People who will still be findable in twenty-five years and who have no stake in anything either of you might be in dispute about. Relatives from outside the immediate situation are usually best; a landlord, a business partner, a tenant or a colleague is usually worst — not because they are dishonest, but because a witness whose answer can be called interested is a weaker witness than one whose answer cannot.

Write three things down about each of the three, on the day: the name spelled exactly as his own documents spell it; a permanent home-district address with the district written out in full; and a number that reaches somebody other than him. Our witnesses page goes through eligibility and the questions people are embarrassed to ask aloud.

Keeping a Document the Statute Calls Conclusive Evidence

Three copies in three places, and on this route the reasoning is sharper than usual.

Keep one where you live. Send one to relatives in a different part of the city — a household that would not be caught up in whatever might one day catch up with yours. And put one back in the home district with whichever relative actually looks after documents. That last placement is the one people skip and the one that pays off: Delhi addresses turn over every few years, while the district address is usually the only one a family still has in common three decades later.

Separately from the certificate itself, write down three facts about it during the first week and store that note somewhere else entirely: which office made the entry, what date it was made, and what serial number it was given in the Marriage Certificate Book. Armed with those, replacing a lost certificate is paperwork and a payment. Without them it becomes somebody hunting through a register room with no idea what they are hunting for. Additional certified copies, apostille and attestation are all covered on our marriage certificate page.

Then say the arrangement aloud to one other grown-up in the house — which of the three places is holding which copy — and say it on an uneventful day. Think about when this document gets wanted in a hurry: in a hospital corridor, after a death, against somebody's deadline, in front of an official. None of those are days on which a family searches an almirah successfully.

And read the whole thing through the day it reaches you, with both Aadhaar cards open beside it. Spellings are the slow part and the important part. After them: each father's name in the form that man writes it himself; each date of birth against whichever age paper was filed — and on this route check that one twice, because twenty-one is a condition of the registration; the date of the ceremony; both addresses; the three witnesses' names; and the serial. If anything is wrong, raise it immediately — our correction page sets out the procedure, and catching it at the table beats catching it at a passport counter in two years.

Which Office, and Why This Website Names None

Both routes happen at the office holding jurisdiction over your address, and we name no office anywhere on this website, deliberately.

Blame the 2026 remapping for that. The lines between sub-divisions were moved, and an office name printed on a web page stops being true quicker than a household can get round to using it. Being turned away at a counter because the address now belongs somewhere else costs a working day, and it costs something harder to replace, which is the couple's belief that the thing can be done at all.

So tell us the address on the phone and you will be told which office covers it as of this week. No charge, and nothing has to be booked to get that one answer.

Two worries come up at this point and both have easy answers. A certificate you are already holding is completely unaffected by a redrawn boundary: it stands as it stood, and no part of the process happens twice. And no register anywhere was thrown away when the lines moved — each one followed the area it belonged to. If an old entry cannot be found, put the request in writing first and hold a right-to-information application back for the day that request returns empty; the sequence is on our Mayur Vihar Phase 2 page.

And if a file has gone in and then gone quiet, that is not something you simply have to live with. There is Delhi legislation putting time limits on notified services, with the defaulting officer paying compensation out of his own pocket — our Lajpat Nagar page walks through how a household invokes it.

How the appointment works and what the department publishes about turnaround are on our appointment page and our process page.

The Provisions, Collected

Everything this page relies on, in one place. The middle column gives each Act’s own words except where the row says otherwise.

Provision	The Act’s own words	What it decides for you
SMA s.13(1)	On solemnisation the Marriage Officer enters a certificate in the Fourth Schedule form in “the Marriage Certificate Book and such certificate shall be signed by the parties to the marriage and the three witnesses”	Three witnesses, signing the certificate itself.
SMA s.13(2)	The certificate “shall be deemed to be conclusive evidence of the fact that a marriage under this Act has been solemnized and that all formalities respecting the signatures of witnesses have been complied with”	The strongest thing any of these documents is. Conclusive of those two matters — and of nothing beyond them.
HMA s.8(4) — for contrast	The Hindu Marriage Register is open for inspection and “shall be admissible as evidence* of the statements therein contained”*	Allowed in, and counts — but the argument can still be had. This is the gap the whole page is about.
SMA s.15, opening words	“Any marriage celebrated, whether before or after the commencement of this Act… may be registered under this Chapter… if the following conditions are fulfilled”	A marriage from any year qualifies, and the section does not ask what the ceremony was.
SMA s.15(a)	“a ceremony of marriage has been performed between the parties and they have been living together as husband and wife ever since”	Two limbs, and the second is continuing. A long separation is a real question, and one for an advocate.
SMA s.15(b)	“neither party has at the time of registration more than one spouse living”	Why a decree or a death certificate is asked for on a second marriage.
SMA s.15(c)	“neither party is an idiot or a lunatic at the time of registration” — the Act’s own language, quoted not chosen	Capacity is a condition of the registration.
SMA s.15(d)	“the parties have completed the age of twenty-one years* at the time of registration”*	Both of you, 21. Against HMA s.5(iii)'s 21 and 18 — so a validly married wife of nineteen cannot use this route yet.
SMA s.15(e)	“the parties are not within the degrees of prohibited relationship”	The relationship bar, as under the other Act.
SMA s.16	On an application “signed by both the parties” the Officer “shall give public notice… and after allowing a period of thirty days for objections and after hearing any objection… shall, if satisfied that all the conditions mentioned in section 15 are fulfilled, enter a certificate… signed by the parties… and by three witnesses”	Thirty days of public notice on a marriage you already have. The fact most often left out when this route is sold.
SMA s.18	From the date of entry the marriage is “deemed to be a marriage solemnized under this Act”, and children born after the ceremony, whose names are also entered, are “deemed to be and always to have been the legitimate children of their parents”	“Always to have been” — not from the date of registration. The clause settled households care about most.
SMA s.24(2) — described, not quoted whole	The void-marriage section does not apply to a marriage deemed solemnised under s.18, but such a registration “may be declared to be of no effect if the registration was in contravention of any of the conditions specified in clauses (a) to (e) of section 15”	The trapdoor. Why the five conditions are not paperwork, and why no figure is worth a false statement here.
SMA s.19	A marriage under the Act of a member of an undivided family professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion “shall be deemed to effect his severance from such family”	Half of the warning people are given.
SMA s.21	Succession to the property of a person married under the Act, and of the issue of such marriage, “shall be regulated by the provisions of” the Indian Succession Act, 1925	The other half.
SMA s.21A	Where the marriage is of a person professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion with a person professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion, “section 19 and section 21 shall not apply”	The section that gets left out. For a couple where both are Hindu, both warnings above are switched off by statute.
SMA s.4	A marriage “between any two persons” may be solemnised under the Act	The fresh route, open whatever anybody's religion.
HMA s.8(5)	“the validity of any Hindu marriage shall in no way be affected by the omission to make the entry”	Nobody may frighten you into any of this. You are already married; this is about proof.
HMA s.7	A marriage is solemnised by the customary rites of either party, complete and binding at the seventh step where the saptapadi is included	The ceremony was the marriage. Everything on this page is about what record of it you choose.

One limit covers every row. These are provisions of two marriage Acts, each serving its own purposes. No row tells you which route your own facts qualify for, whether section 15(a) is satisfied by any particular history, what any Marriage Officer will accept, what a court would hold any of these provisions to mean, or what any of it does to anybody's property. Section 24(2) is described rather than quoted whole, and the reason is in the sources section below.

Ten Things That Go Wrong

Not legal errors — the ordinary, avoidable ones, in the order we see them.

One — buying the thirty-day route when the no-notice route was what you wanted. The single most expensive mistake on this page. A couple who simply wanted the State to have a record of a wedding from 2017 gets quoted a Special Marriage Act process, waits a month and accepts a public notice they never needed.

Two — believing Chapter III has no notice because the marriage is old. Section 16 applies the public notice and the thirty days regardless. Being married nine years changes nothing about it.

Three — not knowing about the twenty-one floor. A validly married wife of nineteen or twenty cannot use this route yet, however much anybody wants her to. Register under the Hindu Marriage Act now; the Chapter III option keeps.

Four — arriving with two witnesses. Three are needed on both Special Marriage Act routes, and they sign the certificate itself. This is the commonest reason a day is wasted.

Five — accepting arranged witnesses. On a document the statute calls conclusive evidence, a signature from somebody who was never present is a defect installed on purpose, and you are the one who keeps the document.

Six — taking the two-sections-out-of-three property warning at face value. Sections 19 and 21 exist; so does section 21A, which switches both off where both parties profess the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion. Ask an advocate rather than a relative.

Seven — treating “conclusive evidence” as conclusive of everything. Section 13(2) is conclusive of two named matters. Section 24(2) shows it is not a shield against everything, and anybody selling it as one is overselling.

Eight — being casual about the age or ceremony statements on the application. Those are the conditions the registration can later be tested against under section 24(2). A false one builds the undoing into the document.

Nine — registering the same marriage twice, under both Acts, for safety. It is not safety. It hands anybody who wants it two documents to set against each other.

Ten — not bringing the ceremony evidence. Section 15(a) wants a ceremony performed. The mandir certificate, the photographs, the card: bring all of it, because this is the clearest answer anywhere on this site to what the mandir paper is for.

What We Charge

There are four figures and nothing concealed under them. If you need more certified copies, a wrong entry put right, apostille or attestation, the fully managed arrangement, or an itemised account of what the State collects, all of that sits on the fee page.

What you would be taking	Price	Which route it is
A wedding already performed, put on the government record	₹6,000	Hindu Marriage Act s.8. No notice, no waiting, no twenty-one floor, two witnesses. By a wide margin what people asking about “court marriage registration” actually want.
Arya Samaj ceremony with the registration handled	₹7,100	The rites and the government entry as one job, for a couple marrying now.
Arya Samaj ceremony alone	₹5,100	The rites and the mandir's own certificate the same afternoon. Married at the seventh step under s.7(2); no government register carries either name yet.
Special Marriage Act, start to finish	₹15,000	Either the fresh marriage under Chapter II or the Chapter III registration of an existing marriage. Same figure, because it is the same notice-and-objection work either way.

Then there is the State's own money, which never passes into this office's hands. It is collected by the department, a receipt comes back for every item, and not one rupee of it has ever been retained here. Normally it comes to three items: the Marriage Clerk's ₹100; a ₹200 charge that Delhi's 2014 Order attaches to the application; and, if and only if you travel the civil road, ₹15 handed over at the District cashier. An older wedding brings in a fourth item, and that item can only ever be one of two numbers. Inside the second sixty-day stretch it is ₹500; beyond that stretch it is ₹1,000. Either one is capable of being waived outright by the ADM or the DM. Which has a consequence households should hear before they postpone this for another year: in terms of that fourth item, nothing separates a 1998 wedding from one five months old.

Some things carry no price here at any sum anybody offers. We supply none of the three witnesses. We write no date for a ceremony that did not take place, and on the Chapter III route that extends to the statement that a ceremony was performed and that you have lived together as husband and wife ever since. We issue nothing unless both of you attend in person. We perform or register no marriage for anybody below the legal age. We neither propose nor arrange any conversion, and we hold no view on anybody's caste, community or faith. We are not advocates and do not practise law: nobody here appears before any court or Marriage Officer as anybody's representative, files any application, drafts any pleading, or advises on divorce, maintenance, custody, domestic violence, succession, inheritance, estates, probate, partition or property — which matters on this page specifically, because two of the sections quoted above are succession sections. And when the truthful thing to say is that what you need this week is an advocate rather than anything we sell, you will hear that instead, on the first call, without being charged for it.

Sources, and the Limits of This Page

Sourced — the Special Marriage Act, 1954. Quoted whole: section 13(1) and 13(2); section 15 with its opening words and all five clauses (a) to (e); section 16 entire; section 18 entire; section 19; section 21; and section 21A. Section 4 and section 20 are referred to in substance.

What was checked, and against what. Every section quoted above was read in a copy of the Act published on a government registration department's own portal and checked word for word against an independently published bare-act text. The two agreed on all of it — including the five clauses of section 15 and the operative words of 13(2), 18, 19, 21 and 21A — and that is the text printed here.

Described rather than quoted whole, and flagged as such above. Section 24(2) is summarised, because it operates through a cross-reference and an exception and a compressed quotation would mislead; the words inside quotation marks in that section are the Act's own, the frame around them is ours, and anybody who needs to rely on that provision needs an advocate rather than our reading of it.

Language we quoted rather than chose. Section 15(c) uses the words “idiot or a lunatic”. That is the statute's wording, not ours; we print it because paraphrasing a condition of registration would be worse than reproducing it.

Sourced — the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955. Section 8(4) and 8(5), quoted whole, and section 7 and section 5(iii) relied on. These were read in three independent published copies, two of which agree word for word; the third prints “Registrar” where the other two print “Register” in section 8(4), and our Arya Samaj mandir page sets that discrepancy out in full along with the whole of section 8.

The rest. The ₹200 on the application, the sixty-day measure and both late amounts come from Delhi's 2014 Order; the ₹100 and ₹15 charges and the department's own published turnaround from Delhi Revenue Department material. False declarations fall under BNS s.236. Apostille and attestation amounts are those the Ministry of External Affairs publishes.

The questions this page cannot answer. Which route your own facts qualify for. Whether any particular history satisfies the continuing requirement in section 15(a). Whether any person has completed twenty-one for the purposes of section 15(d) on any particular document. What any Marriage Officer will require or accept. What manner of public notice is prescribed in any area, or what it contains. Whether any objection is good. Whether any registration could be declared of no effect under section 24(2). Whether any person professes a religion within the meaning of section 21A. And above all: what sections 19, 20, 21 and 21A do to any family's property, undivided or otherwise. Every one of those is a question for an advocate on the facts.

Put as shortly as it can be put: the Arya Samaj ceremony is performed here, and marriages are entered on the government register. Courts, Marriage Officers as anybody's representative, pleadings, succession and property are somewhere else entirely; nobody drawing a wage here goes near them; and not a rupee is taken for any of it. This page quotes two Acts side by side for one reason. The phrase “court marriage registration” is used in Delhi for three different operations, and the certificates they produce are not of equal weight in law — one is admissible evidence, one is conclusive evidence, and the difference is bought with thirty days of public notice, a higher age floor and a third witness. A couple entitled to know that before they pay is the entire reason this page is longer than the page that sold them something.

Before You Call

One — are you already married, or marrying now? That single fact decides which of the three routes is even available to you, and most calls are settled by the answer.

Two — if you are already married, say roughly what year and roughly what ceremony. “Arya Samaj, here, 2017” or “in the village, 2009, no paper at all” is plenty. And tell us both your ages, because twenty-one decides whether Chapter III is on the table this year at all.

Three — say at the start if a public notice would be a problem for you. Families opposed, a live property dispute, a previous marriage that ended badly, a household that moved to get away from something. We would rather know in the first minute than quote you a route that puts your names on a board for thirty days.

Four — if property or inheritance is any part of why you are choosing, see an advocate before you choose. Not after. We will tell you what the four sections say and we will not go a step beyond that.

+91 8376863962 is the number, and document photographs are welcome on WhatsApp whatever the hour. Money is not where the conversation starts. You will first be told which of the three routes your own facts actually belong to, then what we would charge to do it, and then, as a separate figure, what the department will want. If it turns out the ₹6,000 route is the one that suits you rather than the ₹15,000 one, that is what you will hear, and you will not have paid anything to find it out.

Hindu Marriage Act Registration SDM Registration in Delhi The Fresh Court Marriage Route Arya Samaj Mandir in Delhi — Section 8 in Full The Ceremony, Step by Step Registering an Older Wedding Certificate, Copies & Apostille Every Document, Listed Who Can Stand as a Witness Inter-Caste Marriage Inter-Religion Marriage The Notice, Privacy and Safety If Either of You Was Married Before If One of You Lives Abroad The Appointment Correcting a Wrong Entry The Process End to End Every Fee, Listed The Full Question Bank

Court Marriage Registration in Delhi — Your Questions68 Questions Answered

What does 'court marriage registration' actually mean?▼

In Delhi it is used for three different operations. Registering a wedding you already had under the Hindu Marriage Act; marrying afresh through the State under the Special Marriage Act; or registering an existing marriage under the Special Marriage Act's Chapter III.

Which of the three do most people actually want?▼

The first. Somebody had a ceremony and wants the government to have a record of it. That is Hindu Marriage Act section 8 registration, with no notice and no waiting period.

So why does the third one exist?▼

Because the certificate it produces is a different thing in law. Under the Hindu Marriage Act the register is 'admissible as evidence'. Under the Special Marriage Act the certificate is 'conclusive evidence'.

Is that really a difference, or just wording?▼

It is a real difference in what a court is told to do. Admissible means the document is allowed in and counts; the argument can still be had. Conclusive evidence directs a court to treat the fact as established.

Conclusive evidence of what, exactly?▼

Section 13(2) names two things: that a marriage under the Act has been solemnised, and that all formalities respecting the signatures of witnesses have been complied with. Nothing beyond those two.

So it makes my marriage unchallengeable?▼

No, and anybody saying so is overselling it. Section 24(2) lets a Chapter III registration be declared of no effect if it contravened the section 15 conditions.

Can I register a religious marriage under the Special Marriage Act?▼

Yes. That is Chapter III, and section 15 opens it to 'any marriage celebrated, whether before or after the commencement of this Act' other than one already done under that Act or the 1872 Act.

Does it matter what ceremony we had?▼

The section does not ask. It requires only that 'a ceremony of marriage has been performed between the parties'. Arya Samaj rites, a temple, a gurdwara, a church, a nikah, a village custom.

How old does the marriage have to be?▼

There is no age for the marriage. A wedding from 1989 is inside section 15 exactly as one from last month is.

What are the conditions in section 15?▼

Five. A ceremony performed and living together as husband and wife ever since; neither party with more than one spouse living; capacity; both parties having completed twenty-one; and not within the degrees of prohibited relationship.

Twenty-one? Both of us?▼

Both of you, at the time of registration. Section 15(d) says 'the parties have completed the age of twenty-one years at the time of registration'.

But the marriage age for a woman is eighteen.▼

It is, under Hindu Marriage Act section 5(iii) — twenty-one and eighteen. This registration route sets its own higher floor. The marriage is valid; the route is simply not open yet.

My wife is nineteen. What should we do?▼

Register under the Hindu Marriage Act now. It is faster, cheaper, has no notice and no twenty-one floor. If the stronger certificate still matters later, Chapter III covers a marriage from any year, so nothing is lost.

Is there a notice on the Chapter III route?▼

Yes, and this is the fact most often left out. Section 16 requires the Marriage Officer to 'give public notice' and allow 'a period of thirty days for objections'.

Even though we have been married nine years?▼

Even then. Section 16 makes no exception for how long you have been married or whether you have children. The notice goes up anyway.

Why would the State do that on an old marriage?▼

Because the Officer has to be satisfied the five section 15 conditions are met, and must hear any objection received inside the thirty days before entering the certificate.

Who does that notice actually matter to?▼

For most settled couples it is a formality and thirty days is merely slow. For a household whose families never accepted the marriage, or with a live property dispute, a public notice naming both of you is an announcement.

And the Hindu Marriage Act route has no notice at all?▼

None. That is the trade, stated plainly: the stronger certificate is bought with thirty days of visibility.

How many witnesses for each route?▼

Two for the Hindu Marriage Act route. Three for both Special Marriage Act routes, and on those they sign the certificate itself.

Why does the witness number matter so much?▼

Because arriving with two when three are needed is the commonest reason a couple's day is wasted. And section 13(2) makes the certificate conclusive evidence that the witness-signature formalities were met, so the three signatures are part of what is being declared.

Will you provide the third witness?▼

No, at any price. A man who was never in the room cannot truthfully sign to say he was, and on a document the Act calls conclusive evidence that is a defect installed on day one.

What is actually asked of a witness?▼

Very little. Turning up and putting a signature where the officer indicates is the whole job. Nothing is underwritten, no obligation is undertaken, and in practice he will never hear about the matter again.

What does each witness bring?▼

Two papers of his own, issued to him personally: one carrying his photograph, one fixing where he lives.

Who should we choose as witnesses?▼

People still findable in twenty-five years with no stake in anything either of you might dispute. Relatives from outside the situation are usually best; a landlord, partner, tenant or colleague usually worst.

What happens once the Chapter III certificate is entered?▼

Section 18: from the date of the entry the marriage is 'deemed to be a marriage solemnized under this Act'. It is brought inside that Act rather than merely recorded alongside it.

Does it do anything for our children?▼

It does, and it is the clause settled families care about most. Section 18 provides for the names of children born after the date of the ceremony to be entered, and declares them 'deemed to be and always to have been the legitimate children of their parents'.

'Always to have been' — not from the registration date?▼

That is what the section says. For a household that has had nothing on paper for years with children in school, it is worth knowing about.

Can a Chapter III registration be undone?▼

Section 24(2) allows a registration to be declared of no effect where it was in contravention of any of the section 15 conditions (a) to (e). That is why those conditions are not paperwork.

Somebody said a court marriage cuts you out of family property.▼

That comes from two real sections and leaves out a third. Section 19 deems severance from an undivided family, and section 21 pulls succession over to the Indian Succession Act, 1925.

What is the third section?▼

Section 21A. Where the marriage is of a person professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion with a person professing the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jaina religion, 'section 19 and section 21 shall not apply'.

So for a Hindu couple the warning is wrong?▼

For a couple where both parties fall inside that list, sections 19 and 21 are switched off by statute. The person who gave the warning had read two sections out of three.

And if we are not both in that list?▼

Then section 21A does not help you and those sections are live. For a Hindu–Christian, Hindu–Muslim or Hindu–Parsi marriage it is a real consideration, not a rumour.

Will you advise us on the property side?▼

No. We set out what the sections say and stop there. Succession, inheritance, estates, probate, partition and property are entirely outside this office and nothing is charged for them.

Who should we ask then?▼

An advocate, before you choose a route rather than after. Any woman may have one appointed free with her means never inquired into — our Vikaspuri page sets that out and says where legal aid stops.

Does the Chapter III certificate cost more through you?▼

Yes. It is ₹15,000, the same as a fresh Special Marriage Act marriage, because it is the same notice-and-objection work. The Hindu Marriage Act registration of an earlier wedding is ₹6,000.

Why is the cheaper one cheaper?▼

Because there is no public notice, no thirty-day objection period and no hearing. Less process, less work, less money.

Which route do you recommend?▼

We do not recommend. We tell you what each one requires, how long it takes, what it costs and what it produces. The choice is about your privacy, your family and your timing.

What if the cheaper route is right for us?▼

Then that is what you will be told. It happens on most calls, and it is the reason this page prints the twenty-one floor and the thirty-day notice rather than hiding them.

Are we already married if we only had the ceremony?▼

Yes. Hindu Marriage Act section 7(2): where the rites include the saptapadi, the marriage 'becomes complete and binding when the seventh step is taken'.

Is our marriage invalid without any registration?▼

No. Section 8(5): 'the validity of any Hindu marriage shall in no way be affected by the omission to make the entry.' Nobody may frighten you with the opposite.

Then this whole page is about proof, not validity?▼

Exactly that. You are married either way. The question is which record of it you hold and how strong the statute says that record is.

What is the mandir certificate for, then?▼

This page is the clearest answer on the site. Section 15(a) wants a ceremony performed, and the mandir certificate is exactly the kind of material that evidences one.

What else proves the ceremony happened?▼

Photographs showing both faces with the fire in frame, the wedding card, the priest's details. Bring all of it rather than choosing.

What proves 'living together ever since'?▼

A shared address across documents, children's school records naming both parents, a joint account, an electricity or ration record. We will not tell you what satisfies the clause — only which drawer to empty.

We lived apart for three years in the middle.▼

Then clause (a)'s continuing requirement is a real question and not a formality, and it is one for an advocate on your facts. We will not give you an answer on it.

One of us was married before.▼

Bring the decree of divorce or the former spouse's death certificate. Section 15(b) requires that neither party has more than one spouse living at the time of registration.

Can one of us apply and the other sign later?▼

No. Section 16 requires 'an application signed by both the parties to the marriage'. This is not something one spouse arranges while the other is away.

Can we do both registrations, under both Acts, to be safe?▼

No, and it is not safety. One record is correct; two simply hand anybody who wants it a pair of documents to set against each other.

Does the Special Marriage Act ask about our religion?▼

The fresh route is open to 'any two persons' under section 4. Section 15 asks only that a ceremony was performed. Religion enters only through sections 19, 21 and 21A, which are about succession.

Do we have to convert for any of this?▼

No, and not through us in any case. We neither suggest, arrange, require nor facilitate anybody's conversion, and one honest attraction of the Special Marriage Act is that it never asks in the first place.

Why is that section 15(c) wording like that?▼

Because it is the Act's own language. We quote 'idiot or a lunatic' rather than paraphrase it, since rewording a condition of registration would be worse than printing what the statute says.

Are you a court, or a Marriage Officer?▼

Neither, and no private body in India is. We perform the Arya Samaj ceremony and we get marriages entered on the government register. That is the whole of it.

Are you advocates?▼

No. Nobody here practises law, appears in any court, files any application, drafts any pleading or acts for anybody in any proceeding.

Which documents do we bring?▼

Identity and age proof for each of you, address proof for each of you, photographs, your witnesses with their own papers, plus the ceremony evidence on the Chapter III route. The full list by route is on our documents page.

Why does age proof matter more on this route?▼

Because twenty-one is a condition of the registration itself under section 15(d), and section 24(2) lets a registration that contravened it be declared of no effect. Bring the strongest age document, not the handiest.

Which office handles it?▼

The one covering your address this week. No office is named anywhere on this site on purpose: the 2026 remapping moved the lines between sub-divisions, and a name printed on a page stops being true faster than a household gets round to using it.

How do we find out which office?▼

Ring with the address. We will tell you which one it falls under at the moment, free, and you are not asked to book anything to get the answer.

Does a boundary change affect a certificate we already hold?▼

No. It is exactly as good as it was, nothing in it is redone, and no step is repeated.

Nobody can find the register our entry is in.▼

Nothing was thrown away when the boundaries moved — every register followed its own area. Ask in writing first, and hold a right-to-information application back for the day that comes back with nothing. The order to do it in is on our Mayur Vihar Phase 2 page.

We filed and nothing is happening.▼

Not something you have to accept. Delhi legislation puts time limits on notified services and makes the defaulting officer pay compensation himself. How a household invokes it is on our Lajpat Nagar page.

How many copies should we keep, and where?▼

Three. One at home, one with family elsewhere whose circumstances are not tied to yours, and one in the home district with whoever is dependable about paper.

What should we note down separately?▼

Three particulars, kept away from the certificate: the issuing office, the date of the entry, and the serial the entry carries in the Marriage Certificate Book.

Why those three?▼

They turn a lost certificate into a form and a fee rather than a search through a register room by somebody who has to be told what to look for.

What do we check the day it arrives?▼

All of it, with both Aadhaar cards open. Spellings first and slowest, since the statute is about to call this document conclusive evidence of something.

And after the spellings?▼

Each father's name as that man writes it himself, each date of birth against the age paper filed — check that one twice on this route — the ceremony date, both addresses, the three witnesses' names, and the serial.

What if we find a mistake?▼

Raise it at once. Correction is an ordinary procedure and our correction page sets it out, but catching it at the table beats catching it at a passport counter in two years.

Give us the list of what you refuse.▼

Supplying any of the three witnesses. Writing a date for a ceremony that did not happen, or any false statement about living together. Issuing anything unless both of you attend. Any marriage below the legal age. Appearing before any court or Officer as your representative. Advising on succession, inheritance or property. Predicting what any Officer or court will decide. Proposing or arranging a conversion.

Does the first call cost anything?▼

Nothing, including the calls where the useful answer is that the cheaper route is the right one for you, or that you should ring an advocate before choosing at all. +91 8376863962.