Thiruvananthapuram, Jul 11 (IANS): A joke proved costly for four employees at a Kerala marriage registrar office after they refused to hand a man his wedding certificate and instead asked him to marry once more.

State Registration Minister G.Sudhakaran suspended all four government employees from his department for "misbehaviour and dereliction of duty".

In a Facebook post on Thursday, Sudhakaran said when he came to know about this man's predicament he could not take the "nonsense" and ordered the suspension.

Madhusoodhan had walked into the Sub-Registrar's office at Mukkom in Kozhikode seeking an attested marriage certificate 16 years after he got married. He was first made fun of and then made to wait for several days. The document was supposed to be made available on the same day as the request.

"Madhusoodhan had married under the provisions of the Special Marriage Act on February 27, 2003. He needed his certificate on June 19 and had requested for an attested copy of his marriage certificate.

"Instead of doing that, the officials there made fun of him," the Minister said in his social media post.

They asked him to marry once again, so they could quickly issue a marriage certificate, as they did not want to look up the old records, said Sudhakaran.

The minister further noted that when this certificate could have been given then and there, he was asked to wait for three days and also had to suffer the humiliation.

"When this person expressed his displeasure on social media, it came to my notice, I asked a top official in the Registration Department to probe the issue and submit a report.

Following which, "I decided to suspend four employees in the Mukkom office -- Devi Prasad, Sivaraman Nair, T.K.Mohandas and P.B.Rejish and have also ordered for further probe to find out if these people are fit to be in government service," noted Sudhakaran.