• I Paid A Bribe
  • 14 years ago
  • 1308 views

Lost passport

Reported on December 7, 2010 from Hyderabad , Telangana  ι Report #29407

(in my story i wanted to tell you how recommandations and money play a major role in getting things done)

I lost my passport in oct-2009. I went to SR Nagar police station, to give complaint so that i can get FIR copy so that i can apply for passport again. i first talked to the SI there about the procedure, He was very nice and explained me the procedure and asked me to write a complaint and give the complaint to CI and CI will give you the FIR. every thing seemed to be so simple, untill i talked to the CI. The CI did not even bother to listen to what im saying . as soon as i said i lost my passport, he started yelling at me in filthy language, and said i wont take complaint for a week he wanted me to go and search for it. inspite of me repeatedly telling that i dont even know where i lost. he is so arrogant. i was literally pleading him to accept my complaint as i have to travel to USA in 2 weeks from that day.

I lost all my hopes and one of my uncles has some political influence, so he asked me to go to jubilee hills police station and meed a SI named ********** . I talked to him and he also talked to me very nice and explained all the procedure that takes place after i filed complaint and promised me to give FIR next day and said dont give the complaint to any one else in this station, since this involves passport and the process ********** get delayed. then my struggle started from the next day.
i spent 1 week everyday from 9 am till 6pm infront of Jubilee jills police station waiting for the SI. each time i call him he says i will be there in an hour or so and he will never show up or even if he shows up he used to tell me some story and leave asking me to waite for some time.
i was vexed with this and talked to one of my uncles who is in a good position in some govt. department who called him and blasted him. and the very next morning i had my FIR ready even before i went to police station.

once i got the FIR, i want to passport office to find the procedure for applying for a lost passport, the situation there was so pathetic, that the security guard at the information counter would nt let me in, unless i told her the reason why i want to go to the information counter. and once i told her the reason why i want to information counter, she started explaining me who to apply for a lost passport as if she knows everything i have to pay her 250 just to get in and talk to the person at information counter. and then since i have to get the passport in TATKAL(i dont know why they call it as tatkal, even though they say it takes a week to get passport, you have to waite 40 days to get an appointment scheduled) , i have to book an appoint ment to submit all my doucments, the current appointment dates are 40 days from the day, i cannot afford to waite so long, one of my friends introduced me to a broker who said he can get me passport in 10 days. and he asked me to pay 5000 for that. i agreed to do so since i cannot afford to loose my job here in US just for 5000 rupees.

i dont have the 3 forms of address proofs for applying for passport. so the borker charged me 2000 rupees for getting a voter ID on my name. i really wondered who fast he got my voter ID. it took just one day for the agent to get my voter ID.

I have to pay 500 to the police at the entrance to enter into the passport office since he wouldn't allow me inside since my appointment is not on that day.

with all these i was able to get my passport after 10 days.

I felt really bad that i have to go through all these to get a passport. i really dont want to pay any bribe but i was forced to do it, as i dont want to put my career at stake. I think govt. offices should stream line their processes and reduce their waiting time so that they can reduce this corruption.

What is your reaction after reading this report?