Notary
Two situations, two solutions
1. A bilingual document
Where the parties themselves read different languages, the document can be drawn in both — parallel columns, or one language followed by the other, with a clause stating which version governs if they diverge. That governing-language clause matters, and it is routinely left out.
2. A certified translation
Where the document itself is fine in one language but an institution needs it in another — a Gujarati birth certificate for a visa file, a school leaving certificate for a foreign university, a marriage certificate for an embassy, a property document for a bank outside Gujarat — the answer is a certified translation rather than a redrafted document.
Section 8(1)(h) of the Notaries Act, 1952 expressly empowers a Notary to translate, and to verify the translation of, any document from one language into another. The statutory maximum fee for it is ₹100 under Rule 10(1)(j) of the Notaries Rules, 1956. We do this in-house rather than sending it out.
What we translate and certify
Gujarati ⇄ English ⇄ Hindi. Birth, death and marriage certificates; school leaving certificates, marksheets and degrees; property documents, 7/12 extracts and Index-2; affidavits and declarations; court documents; and commercial agreements.
For documents going abroad
A notarised translation is usually the first step. What follows depends on the destination country — authentication by the State Home or HRD department, then the Ministry of External Affairs for apostille where the country is a party to the Hague Convention, and further embassy attestation where it is not. Apostille itself is the MEA's function, not a notary's. Tell us the destination and the purpose and we will set out the whole route before you start.
Drafted here, in Gujarati or English
Drafted by an advocate of 35+ years rather than filled into a downloaded template, e-stamped at a Government authorised centre, and notarised in the same visit. If the parties read Gujarati, the document is drafted in Gujarati — not translated out of an English form, because legal Gujarati has its own settled vocabulary and a literal translation frequently means something looser.
What to bring
- The original document to be translated
- Identity documents for the person concerned
- The country or institution the translation is for
- Any specific format the recipient requires