How to Get a Migration Certificate in Nepal (Basai Sarai)

Eligibility

• Families moving their permanent address from one local level to another
• A single family member aged 18 or over moving alone, subject to the registration precondition
• Households that have already moved but never registered the migration
• Families who registered a migration but left a minor off the record
• People who cannot access local services at their new address because the migration was never recorded
• Anyone updating records before a voter roll, school admission or local service application

Required documents checklist

• □ Leaving: the records transfer form
• □ Leaving: the informant's Nepali citizenship certificate
• □ Leaving: birth registration certificate for each family member under 16
• □ Leaving: citizenship certificate for each family member over 16
• □ Arriving: the original copy of the records transfer form issued at the previous ward
• □ Arriving: citizenship of the household head or the informant
• □ Evidence that every personal event of every family member is already registered, since this is a precondition rather than a formality
• □ The late fee, in the amount your ward office states, if past 35 days

Step-by-step process

1. Clear the family record first. The department states that migration can only be registered once all personal events of all family members have been registered. An unregistered birth or marriage anywhere in the household will stop the migration.
2. Confirm the informant is eligible. For migration the informant must be a family member aged 18 or over.
3. Go to the ward office you are leaving and obtain the records transfer form, taking the informant's citizenship and the age-appropriate document for every member: birth registration under 16, citizenship over 16.
4. Keep the original transfer form safe. It is not a copy you can reprint on demand, and the receiving ward requires the original.
5. Go to the ward office you are moving into with that original transfer form and the citizenship of the household head or informant.
6. If only one adult is moving, note the extra condition. A single family member aged 18 or over can migrate alone, but every event for that person and their family must be registered, and that person must be the informant themselves.
7. If a minor was left off a completed migration, act on the timing. Within one year it can be amended under the rules. Once the amendment period has expired, a fresh migration registration is made with the household head or an adult family member as informant.
8. Note that the office-recommendation route does not apply here. Government employees can register other personal events at the ward where their office sits, but the department excludes migration from that concession.
9. Check the issued record before leaving, since the address on it drives your access to local services.

Fees and timelines

• The department states that a personal event can be registered free of charge within 35 days, or after that on payment of a late fee. Migration sits within the same framework.
• No single national late fee figure is published on an accessible department page. Local levels administer registration, so confirm the amount with the relevant ward office.
• The real timeline driver is the precondition. If any family member has an unregistered birth, death, marriage or divorce, that has to be resolved first, and that can take far longer than the migration itself.
• Migration is a two-office process. Plan for a visit at the ward you leave and another at the ward you join, which is difficult to compress when the two are far apart.
• A missed minor can be amended within one year under the rules; after that the correction becomes a fresh registration.
• DoNIDCR publishes no guaranteed processing period for issuing the record.

Common mistakes

• Treating migration as optional. The department warns that failing to register it can leave you without access to services and facilities provided by the state at your place of residence.
• Turning up before the family record is clean. Migration cannot be registered until all personal events of all family members are registered, and wards apply this strictly.
• Losing the records transfer form. The receiving ward requires the original, and it is not a document you can casually replace.
• Registering at only one end. Leaving and arriving are two separate registrations at two different ward offices.
• Assuming a relative can act as informant for a single-member migration. Where one adult migrates alone, that person must be the informant themselves.
• Leaving a child off the record and discovering it years later. Within one year it is an amendment; afterwards it becomes a new registration.
• Bringing citizenship for a member under 16. The department specifies birth registration for under-16s and citizenship for over-16s.
• Expecting the government employee office-recommendation route to work. The department explicitly excludes migration from that concession.

Office and portal links

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