Gazette Name Change Notification (Gazette of India)

What is a Gazette of India name change notification?

Gazette name change notification is the publication of a change of name, addition of a surname or deletion of a surname as an advertisement in Part IV of the Gazette of India, issued by the Controller of Publications, Department of Publication. It is the central government's formal, permanent record that a named person is now known by a different name.

The Gazette entry is not itself a certificate, and it does not automatically change any other document. What it does is create a citable, dated public record that banks, passport offices, universities, employers and courts accept as evidence when you go on to update your PAN, passport, Aadhaar, degree certificates or service records.

The central gazette is not a state gazette. This distinction causes real confusion. The Gazette of India Part IV is published from Delhi by the Department of Publication under the rules described here, Rs 1,100 printing charges, a physical file sent to Civil Lines, publication in the weekly gazette, and download from egazette.gov.in. Every state, meanwhile, runs its own gazette through its own Government Press, with its own application form, its own fee scale, its own portal and often an entirely online process. Odisha, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and others publish name changes in their state gazettes. A state gazette notification is a valid record in its own right, but it is a different publication and does not appear in the Gazette of India. Decide which one you need before you pay anything: central government employees and most people updating central documents go the Gazette of India route.

Who can publish a name change in the Gazette of India?

You can apply if:

• You are aged 18 years or above, the Department publishes separate guidelines for adults, and this process is the adult one.
• You want a change of name, addition of a surname or deletion of a surname.
• You are an Indian living in India, an Indian living abroad, or a person working with the central government.
• You are willing to first advertise the change in a daily local leading newspaper and hand over that original newspaper.

You cannot apply through this route if:

• You are a minor. Change of name for a minor follows a separate set of guidelines and a separate fee.
• You want to submit through an agent, advocate or consultancy. The Department states that only applications submitted personally or sent by post or courier will be entertained and no other channel is permissible.
• Your documents are more than one year old. The Department requires that documents submitted must not be older than one year.
• Your printing matter is incomplete, vague, unlawful or misleading. The Controller of Publications, as publisher of the Gazette of India, reserves the right to reject any such request.

Two special cases are expressly provided for. A person adopting the name or surname of another religion without changing their own religion must submit an undertaking confirming that they are not changing their religion, and pays an extra Rs 250. A person who is changing religion must declare that in both the newspaper advertisement and the undertaking.

What documents are required for a Gazette name change?

The Department of Publication lists seven items for publication in Part IV:

The prescribed specimen for an adult reads, in substance: "I hitherto known as (old name), son/daughter/wife of (father's or husband's name), employed as (post) in (office or company name), residing at (residential address), have changed my name and shall hereafter be known as (new name)", followed by the line "It is certified that I have complied with other legal requirements in this connection." It is signed in the existing old name, and two witnesses each give full name, signature, address and mobile number.

How to apply for a Gazette of India name change

1. Advertise the change in one of the daily local leading newspapers. The advertisement must state your father's or husband's name along with your residential address. Keep the original newspaper, you will forward it to the Department, not a cutting or photocopy.
2. Prepare the undertaking, duly signed, showing your old and new name with full details of your father's or husband's name and residential address, and declaring that the facts stated are true and correct to the best of your knowledge and belief. Central government employees may instead prepare a Deed for change of name under Ministry of Home Affairs O.M. 190016/1/87-Estt. dated 12 March 1987. Indians living abroad must submit the deed attested by the Indian embassy or High Commission, in original.
3. Type the printing matter on a separate plain paper following the prescribed specimen, in duplicate, computer typed, not handwritten: signed by you in your old name, with two witnesses.
4. Burn the soft copy to a CD in MS Word format. The soft copy must contain the print matter without the witness portion, and must have your old name typed where the signature would be.
5. Pay the printing charges on BharatKosh. Go to bharatkosh.gov.in, the Non-Tax Receipt Portal, and pay Rs 1,100 for an adult, Rs 3,500 if you are an Indian living abroad, or Rs 1,350 where the extra Rs 250 applies for adopting the name or surname of another religion. Print the payment receipt.
6. Assemble the file — undertaking or deed, original newspaper, proforma in duplicate, CD, two self-attested passport photographs, self-attested photo ID copy, the certificate that hard copy and soft copy are similar, and a forwarding letter with the fee receipt.
7. Submit the file personally or send it by post or courier to: Controller of Publications, Department of Publication, Civil Lines, Delhi 110054. Public dealing hours for this purpose are 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM and 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM on all working days.
8. Wait for notification. Once the application is received complete in all respects, the request is sent for notification to the respective Government of India Press.

How do I download my published gazette?

The Department stopped physical printing and sale of the Gazette entirely from 1 October 2015, switching to e-publishing. You download your own copy:

1. Open egazette.gov.in and choose Search Gazette.
2. Set the search category to Weekly Gazette.
3. Select Part IV as the part and section.
4. Set the date range using the two calendars; both pick dates of Saturdays, the first calendar for the start and the second for the end.
5. Download the relevant PDF file.
6. Use Ctrl+F to search the PDF for your old or new name.
7. Download the whole gazette to keep as your own copy. This needs no further certification from the Department.

The Department notes that it will not be responsible for any tampering in downloaded copies of the e-published gazette, so keep the file as downloaded and do not edit it.

How much does a Gazette name change cost?

Payment is made through the BharatKosh (Non-Tax Receipt Portal) at bharatkosh.gov.in, the route in force since 1 October 2018. That is the entire government charge for publication.

Everything else you may spend is optional and private: the newspaper's own advertisement tariff, and an affidavit if you choose to swear one. The Department of Publication does not accept applications through agents or advocates at all; its guidelines say so explicitly. So websites advertising "gazette name change packages" at Rs 3,000 to Rs 9,000 are not filing on your behalf through any privileged channel; at best they are preparing your papers and posting your own file. Nobody can expedite publication, and nobody can guarantee a date, because printing sits with the Government of India Press. Given that the official cost of the actual government step is Rs 1,100, it is worth doing the paperwork yourself.

How long does publication take?

The Department of Publication does not publish a service-level guarantee. In practice, publication in the weekly Gazette of India Part IV commonly takes about one to two months from a complete submission, and the Department states plainly that it will not be responsible for any delay in printing on the part of the concerned Press.

Two things reliably lengthen the wait: an incomplete file, which is not processed at all until it is complete in all respects, and a mismatch between the hard copy and the CD, which is why the Department demands a signed certificate that the two are similar.

Why do Gazette name change applications get rejected?

• Photocopy of the newspaper instead of the original. The guidelines require the original newspaper to be forwarded.
• Handwritten proforma. The proforma must be computer typed.
• Witness portion left in the soft copy, or the signature not replaced by the typed old name in the CD version.
• Missing father's or husband's name or residential address in the newspaper advertisement.
• Documents older than one year.
• Signature in the new name on the proforma. It must be signed in the existing old name.
• No self-attested photo ID proof, which every application must carry.
• Filed through an agent or advocate, which is not a permissible channel.
• Incomplete, vague, unlawful or misleading printing matter, which the Controller of Publications may reject outright.

Because submitted documents are never returned, originals or photocopies, a rejection means preparing and paying for a fresh set. Photograph or scan your entire file before you post it.

Where do I follow up on a Gazette name change?

• Controller of Publications, Department of Publication, Civil Lines, Delhi 110054. The submission and follow-up address.
• Public dealing hours: 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM and 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM on working days.
• egazette.gov.in, to search for and download the published notification.
• bharatkosh.gov.in: to retrieve or re-print a payment receipt.

Carry or quote your forwarding letter details and BharatKosh payment reference when you follow up. No official of the Department will ask you to pay a fee in cash or to any personal account; the only payment channel for these printing charges is BharatKosh.

How to check your application status

The Department of Publication does not run an online tracking portal or a ticket-number lookup for gazette name change files, so checking status is a mix of watching for the published entry and following up directly with the office that holds your file.

1. Confirm your file was received. If you submitted by post or courier, check the courier's delivery record or use registered post with acknowledgement due, so you have proof the Department received the file before you start asking about progress.
2. Wait out the normal publication window before following up. Since publication commonly takes about one to two months, contacting the Department in the first few weeks rarely yields useful information; the file may simply be in the queue for the Government of India Press.
3. Search egazette.gov.in periodically once the window has passed. Use Search Gazette, set the category to Weekly Gazette, the part to Part IV, and move the Saturday-to-Saturday date range forward week by week until your name appears. This is the only authoritative confirmation that your notification has actually been published, since the Department does not send an SMS, email or letter when publication happens.
4. If nothing appears after two to three months, follow up in person or by letter with the Controller of Publications, Department of Publication, Civil Lines, Delhi 110054, during public dealing hours of 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM and 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM on working days. Quote your forwarding letter reference and the date you submitted the file, since there is no separate application or reference number issued at intake.
5. Have your BharatKosh payment reference ready when you follow up. This is the one piece of documentary proof that ties your name to a specific payment and date, and it is what the office will ask for if your physical file cannot be located quickly.
6. Treat a long silence as a sign to check completeness, not just wait longer. Because an incomplete file is not processed until it is complete in all respects, a delay well beyond two months more often means a document was missing or the hard copy and CD did not match, than that the file is simply slow. A visit or written query is the only way to learn this, since the Department does not proactively notify applicants of a returned or held file.

There is no fee or portal for a status check itself. Since the Department processes name change requests only through personal submission or post, and does not accept queries through agents or advocates either, any follow-up should be made by the applicant themselves, in writing or in person, addressed directly to the Controller of Publications.