NEWS / Living Indian man issued death certificate due to bureaucratic error

A bureaucratic error has resulted in a living Indian man receiving his own death certificate after he attempted to apply for his grandfather’s death certificate. The error has caused some serious legal problems for the man, who has been treated by government agencies as if he is “dead” for the past 17 months.

Ganapati Khachu Kakatkar, a resident of Savgaon village in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, attempted to apply for the death certificate of his grandfather, Masanu Shattu Kakatkar, who passed away February 2, 1976, as he, along with 7 siblings and cousins, needed it to apply for a succession certificate to claim rights to over 6 acres of land inherited from his grandfather. Since none of the 8 individuals received the death certificate from their local revenue office, they filed a petition with the Fourth Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMFC) court in the city of Belagavi. The court then instructed the local revenue office to issue the grandfather’s death certificate.

According to The New Indian Express, the local revenue office prepared the grandfather’s death certificate. As Ganapati was about to pick up the vital record, the government official behind the computer asked Ganapati for his ID card. He then erroneously printed Ganapati’s ID number on the death certificate instead of that of his grandfather. The error resulted in Ganapati’s ID number getting “locked” and his name getting deleted from the ration card. Once this was discovered on August 3, 2023, Ganapati attempted to resolve the issue with a number of local government offices but was unable to find a solution, as based on computer data, government officials kept insisting that Ganapati was, in fact, deceased.

Ganapati was no longer eligible for any benefits or succession rights as his name was automatically deleted from government databases. On January 6, 2025, Ganapati contacted Belagavi Deputy Commissioner Mohammed Roshan in an attempt to prove that he is actually alive. Roshan promised to look into the matter, but as of now, it is unclear how long the man would have to wait before government officials would start treating him as a living human being.