- Bribe Fighter
- 12 years ago
- 10777 views
I got a call from JB Nagar Police Station to visit the Police Station…
I got a call from JB Nagar Police Station to visit the Police Station with a copy of old Passport, Address Proof, 1 year Bank Statement with Passbook and 2 photographs. I was not comfortable taking the bank statement as even the Passport office did not insist on that. I expressed over the phone, I cannot bring the bank statement and asked if a Voter Id will be enough. I hear from the other side, “OK BRING IT”. I was prepared to visit the PS multiple times and was determined not to pay a bribe for this work.
Couple of days later I visited the PS with the above set of documents and Waited there for 10 minutes for the concerned person to come. Once he appeared, he asked me to write a covering letter which I did. In the meantime, he looked at the documents, affixed my photographs and then got signatures in appropriate places and said “Its done”. I responded to him “Thank You” and when I was about to leave the place, with a feeble voice, he said “fees”. I was not sure if I heard something correctly and reconfirmed. He said “FEES”. I showed him the receipt of 1500/- that I paid in the passport office and said, “I paid it already”. He said that’s different. I told him I am told there is no fees to be paid in the PS for Passport verification. With a grunting voice, he asked who told? I referred to the Police department website where it is mentioned there is no fees for this purpose and also indicated to him the SAKALA website also tells the same. But still he was insisting on “FEES”. I said, I am not ready to pay anything un-official for this and that is by principle. He said “Oh, Principle??”. Then he looked at my application and asked who are my references. When I mentioned about the ones in the application form, he asked if I don’t have good terms with my neighbors. I said, “Why not, I am in good terms”. Then he insisted on getting reference letter from my neighbor. I asked him what should be written in the letter. He said, they need to say I know this person and his conduct is good. Then I left the place saying I will get it.
Next day, I took a reference letter from one of my neighbors and gave it to him. Looking at it, he said, “I need two”. I hated myself for not asking this question to him the previous day, that how many reference letters are needed. My bad!! I asked him if I can give the phone number of one of my neighbors to whom he can talk over the phone. He refused saying we need this for records. Fair enough, I asked him this time if that is the only thing that he would be needing or anything more? He said, that will do.
Next day, I took another reference letter and went. He was not there. I did not want to wait. I handed over the letter to someone in the PS and requested him to hand it over to the concerned person. I was in a dilemma if I should have taken an acknowledgement, but left it there. Came out and sent an SMS to the concerned person saying the reference letter is handed over in the PS and asked him to confirm it he had received. As always, there was no response. I did not bother to go back again to the PS and that’s the end of my visit. 2 weeks later I got my Passport delivered.