- I Paid A Bribe
- 14 years ago
- 1536 views
Bribed for being a overseas student
- Police
- Police Verification for Passport
- Paid INR 500
I am a Srilankan national presently working as a Software developer in London. I completed my B.E in a private institution situated in Keeranur, a village 25 Km's south of Thiruchirapalli(Trichy) in Tamil Nadu.
As a foreign national intending to stay in Tamil Nadu for more than 6 months, I was required to register my address of stay which was the college hostels, with the local police.Since Keeranur belonged to the Pudukkottai district I visited the commissioners office in Pudukkottai with all releveant documents.
The officer handling registrations was an old, ignorant lethargic person with no sense of commitment towards his job or state.After waiting several hours I was told to come back the following and when I went in the next week I was made to outside for 5 hours only to be told that my registration want ready. This happened for another couple of weeks at which point I got frustrated and fed up.
The fourth week I was told that there will be a charge of Rs 500/= for processing my application. When asked why he said to ask my seniors at college. I later learnt that this officer's son was a senior at my college and he had done this to my Srilankan seniors.
The ugly bit was that the son even collects these bribes on behalf of his dad form his class mates. Such a disgrace. I wanted to take a secret camera and film all this, but then my friends advised me against that as there's no way I could file a case against the Police and expect justice to be served in India.
Bribery in India has been there for centuries and will continue to exist until the citizens of India act against it. It has become a part of daily existence that nobody even took it seriously until the recent scandals. The dreams of India becoming a developed nation will have to be fantasy till then.