Me and my wife recently started having conversations about school admissions for our kid. The conversation moved to what documents do we need for the admission.
We had the birth certificate. We had Aadhaar card. But, just to be sure, we went to a school of our interest to confirm the list of documents. They mentioned something called Samagra card. We talked to others about it. It turns out, it’s a unique identifier for families. Aadhaar identifies a person. Samagra identifies families.
The time had come for a dreadful visit to a government office.
Here’s the first thing I hate about these offices: There is no information about departments and the person responsible for a particular job. You just ask the first person you see and they will guide you to another person.
We reached the municipal office and asked the first person we saw and as expected, we were directed towards another office. Ultimately, after jumping from one person to another we were informed that Samagra ids not created here, but, in a different office!
Here’s another thing that I hate about these places: They are a stickler for documents. Either these people have been programmed to harass people about missing documents or incorrect information in them or they just like having fun and mess with people. All of us have seen scenarios where the conversation goes like this: “You Aadhaar card has the name `Ankit K Kante`, but, your 10th marksheet has the name `Ankit Kante`“. A missing letter makes me an entirely different person or a fraud who is going to commit a crime in the future. And I get it. They have to be strict about such things. People can misuse documents and get benefits. But, hey, there must be some humane way to go about it.
And finally the thing hated by everyone: Bribes. Indian schools should provide a course on how to have conversations related to bribes. I am never able to differentiate when a government officer is genuinely pointing out that something is missing in my documents or he is just creating an environment to ask for a bribe. Schools should stop taking students for the tour of a zoo or a museum. Students should be taken to municipal corporations and given live demo of how to have conversations that will eventually lead to a bribe.
State and central governments are trying to creating online portals for such things, but, one way or another they lead people back to these offices. So, for example, in case of Samagra, you can add yourself online, but, if you want to get your information transferred from one city to another, you will have to visit the municipal office.
Here’s another example: In MP, the electricity board has a portal to change the name in your electricity bills. They make you upload all the documents and take some fees as well. But, they don’t really do anything with it. I visited the electricity board office after applying online and their reply was: “Even though you applied through portal, you have to submit documents here.“ What’s the point of uploading documents then!?
It’s just frustrating. I now have to apply for a passport for my kid. I have heard that process is much smoother. But for that I have to go through police verification which is another challenge. Fingers crossed and hoping to pay the least amount of bribe.
Ankit