Bifurcation changed what the document says
Andhra Pradesh was divided in 2014, creating Telangana. A document issued before that date names an undivided Andhra Pradesh; one issued after names whichever successor state the issuing authority now belongs to. Hyderabad, where a great many records originate, moved into Telangana.
This causes real confusion abroad. An applicant may hold a birth certificate naming Andhra Pradesh, a degree from a Hyderabad university now in Telangana, and a passport listing a current address in a third arrangement. To a foreign official checking consistency, that can look like three unrelated places.
Our translations render the state exactly as printed on the document and, where it helps, note the successor authority. That single annotation frequently prevents a query, because the official can then see that the change is administrative rather than a discrepancy in your history.
If you hold documents spanning 2014, send them together. Translated as a set with consistent treatment, the timeline reads coherently; translated separately over months, it does not.
Pattadar passbooks and land records
Land rights in both successor states are evidenced through pattadar passbooks and related revenue records, which record survey numbers, extent of holding, classification of land and the pattadar’s entitlement.
These are tabular, frequently handwritten in older entries, and use revenue vocabulary with no English equivalent. Extent is commonly recorded in acres and guntas, a subdivision unfamiliar outside India, and converting it silently to a decimal figure loses the precision the original carries. We render the original units and give a conversion in a note.
Families managing inherited land from abroad are the usual requesters, and the numbers in these documents determine shares. We ask rather than guess where a handwritten figure is ambiguous.
Certificates with no foreign counterpart
Both states issue caste, income and nativity certificates for purposes internal to India. They sometimes accompany applications abroad as supporting evidence of identity or origin.
We translate them literally, rendering the issuing authority and the stated purpose precisely, and we do not attempt to map an Indian community category onto any foreign concept. No equivalent exists, and a mapping would be interpretation rather than translation.
Script identification
Telugu and Kannada scripts descend from a common ancestor and look similar to a reader of neither. Documents are occasionally sent to us identified as the wrong one.
This costs nothing to resolve — send a photograph and we will tell you which it is before quoting. It matters because the translator has to be right for the language, and a Telugu reader cannot simply read Kannada on the strength of visual resemblance.
Gulf employment and the attestation chain
A large share of this pair relates to employment in Gulf states, which sit outside the Hague Convention. That means embassy attestation rather than apostille — state authentication, then the Ministry, then the destination mission.
It is a longer process than most applicants expect and it runs on the mission’s schedule. Tell us your joining date at the outset and we will be honest about whether the full chain fits.