- I Paid A Bribe
- 13 years ago
- 2145 views
Harassment by officials force to go to touts
- Passport
- Police Verification for Passport
- Paid INR 5,000
I am living abroad for last two years and wanted my mom to come visit me. She needed a passport and we applied for one about 18 months ago. Then our ordeal started. Demand for bribes started with verification officer who visited our house which was so blatant that shocked us. We didnt comply (a grave mistake) and as a result there was an adverse comment in the file. And this started a series of visits to the inhumane passport office. My mom was born in a village and thus neither has a birth certificate or a schooling certificate. Rest all documents like bank accounts, voter ID, ration card etc are there. In addition my dad is in government service for last 30 years. These facts should be enough for getting a identity document like Passport. But like so many other hapless people we didnt realize that we had committed a grave mistake by refusing to bribe a government official. Our harassment continued on one pretext or the other till we gave in and approached one of the dozens of touts loitering about. Once money was exchanged there was a telling comment from one of the passport office clerks - "agar pehle hi de ********** hota toh na toh itna time lagta aur na hi itne paise". We were humiliated but could do nothing in front of the might of Indian bureacracy. This experience has made me wonder if i should ever return to India, a place where a citizen is made to run from pillar to post just to get an identity card.