I
applied for my passport around a year back. At that point of time, I had
recently moved to a new city and hadn’t found myself a suitable place where I
could think to stay for considerable amount of time. So I decided to apply for a passport from my
home-town.
This
seemingly innocuous step turned out to be a beginning of one of the longest,
dreaded and draining chapters of my life. What made matters worse was that my
employer had a policy which linked a passport to my professional progress,
hence the pressure to get this document increased a little bit more.
Once
I applied from my home-town in a matter of few weeks a police inquiry was
initiated. Of several questions that the police has to answer in Yes or No; one
checks whether an applicant is staying at an address from where he is applying.
The police official sent a negative report requesting passport issuing
authority not to issue me the passport. Not only did he send a negative report
despite my repeated requests, he also insulted, bullied and threatened me of
consequences of this mistake. His
rudeness made me realize that any discussion with that man was going to be
futile.
I
moved back to work and decided to wait for the passport office to send me a
notice for clarification due to the negative Police Verification Report. This
wait went very long, so I decided to fly back to my hometown and check with the
passport office as to why they had not sent me the notice. I also enquired with
them if I could myself pay the penalty and close my application so that I can
re-apply from the city where I worked. However they rejected this request
saying that without a notice, they could not accept the penalty. I had no
option but to wait for the notice, in order to pay the penalty and close that
application.
Couple of months went by, but the notice still
did not come. So I went again, to check why I had not been sent this notice. On
enquiring this time, I found that the Passport office had received an
electronic report, but they had still not received a hard copy of it from the
police department. They told me; again I had to wait till they receive a hard
copy of the report. By this time, I was
angry and frustrated by snail like pace of this process so I decided to check
with the police authorities for status of the hard copy of report.
Unfortunately, state elections were going on during these days, and I was told
all cops were busy with duties for it, and I should check post elections.
By
this time, I was exhausted both economically and emotionally. I had started
having nightmares that my passport will perhaps never come, that in this
slowing economy, I may lose a job (where I was doing quite well) due to such a
stupid and unfortunate accident called -- Bureaucracy. On the other hand my
bank account was depleting due to repeated trips to my hometown!!
Post
elections, I went back again – this time I had taken a leave of full three days
and had resolved to get this application closed at any cost. I had told one of
my close friends that this time I had come with a same kind of resolve that
Gandhi had made when he left Sabarmati Ashram. Looking back it seems hilarious
how a small piece of document had become so important to me! J
This
time, I first went to the police officials and took a dispatch number through
which they had sent my report to the Passport office. Having made me sit out
for entire day, police official obliged in the evening by giving me dispatch
number and date. I left his office after profusely thanking him.
Armed
with this lethal weapon, I went to passport office again. Giving the dispatch
number I had thought I would almost order them to find my report, generate a
notice, accept the penalty and give me a closure letter.
However
in span of three hours my vigour had fizzled out. Even with the dispatch number
they could not trace my report. I suggested them same thing that I had told
them, again and asked if I could pay the penalty basis my own submission.
While
all these events were happening, my employer was also constantly enquiring
about the status of my passport application. Although they had given me a
timeframe of one year, nobody likes the constant sword looming on one’s head. I
had already started feeling a second class citizen because of not having a
passport.
What happened to my suggestion???
To be
continued in next piece
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