The Senate approved a bill on August 8 that would allow parents to give a child a surname derived directly from the father's first name. The change amends the Article 69 of the Family Code.
Under current law, Article 69 states that a child's surname is determined by the parents' surnames. If the parents have different surnames, the child is given the father's or mother's surname by mutual consent. Parents may also choose to give the child a surname derived from the grandfather's name, on either the father's or mother's side, where this aligns with national traditions.
However, the current version of the article does not allow for a surname to be formed directly from the father's first name. Presenting the bill, Senator Odiljon Mamatkarimov said: "The current lack of a mechanism allowing a child to be given the father's name as a surname has drawn legitimate objections from the public".
As examples, lawmakers cited men who grew up in orphanages, as well as children of parents who have been stripped of their parental rights. In such cases, the report's author explained, a person may not want their own child's surname to be derived from their father's name.
Senators were also told that the option to form a child's surname from the father's or grandfather's name already exists in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.
"On this basis, the bill has proposed that Article 69 of the Family Code be supplemented with a provision allowing a child to be given the father's name as a surname," the report stated.
The authors say the change will give parents more options and allow them to make choices that better reflect national and religious traditions.
The amendment is part of a broader law proposing changes and additions to several regulations. Besides the Family Code, it also touches on legislation governing archival affairs, as well as licensing, permitting and notification procedures. The bill was approved by the Senate.
The Legislative Chamber had earlier passed the amendments in their first reading on January 13. At the time, Deputy Justice Minister Numon Muhammadiev said that in practice, parents often want to form a child's surname from the father's first name, but the current wording of Article 69 does not explicitly allow for this.
He said that every day, 10 to 15 parents amend their child's birth records some time after birth in order to register the name and surname they actually wanted. As examples, he cited families in which the father grew up in an orphanage or was himself the child of a parent stripped of parental rights.
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