Death Registration
The death of every person shall be registered by the registrar for the district in which he died or in which he was ordinarily resident before death. Where a body of a dead person is found and there is not available any information as to the place of death, death may be registered in the district in which the body is found.
The following persons are qualified to give information: a relative of the deceased who has knowledge of the particulars required to be registered concerning the death, a person present at the death, an administrator or executor, an occupier of premises in which the death occurred, a person finding the body, a person taking charge of the body, a person procuring the disposal of the body.
It is the primary duty of the relatives of the deceased with knowledge of the particulars to register the death. If there is no such relative or person mentioned above, then other categories of persons who are obliged to give the information to the registrar, within five days of a death. Once one qualified informant signs the register and gives the information, the other persons are no longer under a duty to do so.
Where the qualified informant in relation to a death sends written notice, accompanied by the medical certificate referred to below, particulars to be registered need not be registered within the period of five days and a period of 14 days is substituted.
Before the expiration of the period and date of death, the death has not been registered because of the failure of a qualified informant to give necessary information to the registrar, a notice may be served on qualified informants requiring them to personally attend (amended 2011?) and give information to the best of their knowledge, information, and belief.
A registrar shall not register the death of a person after one year otherwise than with the written authority of the Registrar General. This does not apply to a death after an inquest.
The Registrar General shall furnish to every registrar, certificates of the cause of death, to be used by registered medical practitioners, which are to be furnished to medical practitioners residing in their district. Where a person dies as a result of natural illness for which he is being treated by a registered medical practitioner, within 28 days prior to death, the practitioner shall sign and give a qualified informant a certificate in the prescribed form, stating to the best of his knowledge and belief, the cause of death together with such other particulars as may be prescribed.
A registered medical practitioner shall not give an informant a certificate if he or any other person has referred the death to a coroner or he intends to do so; or he has reason to believe the deceased died as a result of an industrial disease of the lungs. The informant shall, within five days of the date he receives a certificate, deliver it to the registrar.
An informant is to give a copy of the certificate to the registrar within five days of receiving it. Where a registrar receives a notice from a coroner as a result of his investigations of any death, or a certificate from a coroner stating the cause of death, the registrar is to register the death in pursuance of information given by the qualified informant but shall enter the cause of death as given by the coroner’s statement or certificate.
On registering a death, the registrar shall, unless the coroner has issued an authorization to bury or cremate the body, forthwith give free of charge a death certificate in the prescribed form, confirming that he has registered the death.
A registrar may, before registering the death, give to the person sending the notice, if required to do so, a certificate in the prescribed form that he has received notice of death. Where a person receives a registrar’s certificate or authorization, he shall send it to the person who is effecting the disposal of the body or performing any funeral service.
Where a person who has control over or ordinarily effects the disposal of bodies at any burial ground or other place, he shall, unless he receives a death certificate or certificate of authorization, give notice of the disposal to the registrar within seven days.