In a significant relief for students, the National Examinations Board (NEB) has issued a notice confirming the legal path for students to correct discrepancies in their birth certificate details ( date, name, age, and surname), allowing them to meet the minimum age requirement for the Secondary Education Examination (SEE).
The notice directed all concerned secondary schools to cooperate with the local registrar's offices, and also requested support from the local level to execute the birth registration amendment system.
The directive comes in response to complications arising from the age limit requirements for SEE eligibility. According to Rule 78 (6) of the Education Regulations 2059 (Sixth Amendment), students who have not completed five years of age cannot enroll in Grade 1, and students who have not completed 14 years of age by the end of Chaitra of the examination year will not be allowed to attend the Secondary Education Examination (SEE). This applies to students currently filling out exam forms for the SEE of the year 2082, as well as those registering in Class 9 for the SEE of 2083. Schools and parents had reported that discrepancies in birth certificates and Grade 8 certificates meant many otherwise eligible students would not legally meet this 14-year threshold on paper, risking their disqualification from the upcoming board exams.
Acknowledging these complications, NEB cited a recent legal amendment made to the National Identity Card and Registration Act 2076, as published in the Nepal Gazette on Shrawan 14, 2082, which permits a one-time correction of personal details, including name, age, and surname, upon application to the local registrar's office. For this, students and guardians can now submit an application in the prescribed format to their local registrar's office to rectify these errors. This measure is expected to facilitate students whose official documents contain age errors, allowing them to meet the criteria for the upcoming SEE.
For the implementation of this system, which is based on Rule 23 of the National Identity Card and Registration (Second Amendment) Regulation 2082, schools are mandated to cooperate with the local registrar's office by providing certified records confirming that the students are enrolled in Class 9.
Furthermore, a joint decision made with the Center for Education and Human Resource Development (CEHRD) on 2082/08/17 confirmed that once the birth registration is corrected, the corresponding details in the Educational Management Information System (EMIS) must be updated. Respective schools are responsible for updating corrected details of students from Grades 1 to 7, while the concerned local level authorities are updating corrected details of students of Grade 8 in EMIS.
View the official notice here:
