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Documents required for any govt service — 31 checklists
Quick Reply: Complete document checklists for 31 top Indian government services — Aadhaar, PAN, passport, ration card, PMAY, scholarship, GST, FSSAI, marriage certificate and more. Find the service, click for the full list.
Direct answer. Find the service below; click for the complete document list, format/size specifications, where to apply, and what to do if a document is missing.
How to read any checklist. Whatever the service, the documents asked for almost always fall into four buckets: proof of identity (Aadhaar, PAN, passport, voter ID), proof of address (utility bill, passbook, rent agreement), proof of age or date of birth (birth certificate, school certificate, passport), and service-specific proof (income certificate, caste certificate, property papers). If you keep one folder with a current copy of each bucket, you can walk into most counters prepared. Three practical rules save most visits:
- Self-attestation is usually enough. Most services accept self-attested photocopies; carry originals only for counter verification, and never leave an original behind.
- Names must match across documents. The commonest rejection is not a missing paper but a spelling mismatch between, say, the bank record and Aadhaar. Fix the mismatch before applying, not after rejection.
- Birth registration has a 21-day window for a newborn, after which a late-registration route with additional proof applies. Registering on time is the cheapest document decision a family makes.
Frequently asked questions
Do attested copies still exist?
Gazetted-officer attestation survives in a few old forms, but self-attestation is the default for most citizen services now. If a counter demands gazetted attestation for something routine, ask for the requirement in writing — it usually softens.
What if my name is spelled differently on two documents?
Get the mismatch fixed at the source that is cheaper to change — usually the bank record or the Aadhaar detail — before you apply for the service that will reject it. Keep one affidavit ready where an old mismatch cannot be corrected at source.
Can I apply with a photocopy if the original is lost?
For most services, the copy plus an FIR or lost-document note works where the original was a registered document. For identity documents, apply for a reissue instead — a photocopy of a PAN or passport is not a document at all.
If a document is missing
Before paying an agent, check whether the document can be replaced: municipal bodies reissue birth and death certificates, UIDAI corrects Aadhaar details, and boards reissue certificates. And when the office that holds your record simply will not release it — an old case file, a verification report, a payment record — that is not a documents problem, it is an information problem, and the RTI route solves it: ask for the record by name under Section 6(1), and the 30-day clock of Section 7(1) starts running.
- 🪄 AI RTI Drafter — request rejection reasons under §4(1)(d) in 60 seconds
- 📅 Timeline Calculator — track 30-day window post-application
All document checklists
Related
- The RTI Playbook — the full manual behind every checklist here