A few days back, dear sister chalojai (who has completed her 100 blogs on MS today) had discussed the point of fruitless attestation of documents by gazetted officers. Today I am also sharing a problem emerged due to government rules and procedures, being faced by me. I have yet to get a passport and I want the passports to be arranged for the whole of my family including my wife, my mother and my both the children because if at all, at any point of time, we plan to spend our holidays somewhere abroad, all of us will go. Hence since last year, I have been trying to arrange the of myself and my family members. Till now, I have not been able to arrange them. Reasons ? Please check the hurdles being spelled out below :
N.O.C. from the employer organization because I am serving in a public sector undertaking. After a lot of difficulty I had obtained that N.O.C. which has expired because the validity of the same is just a few months. Once it expires, you have to undergo the procedure once again to obtain a fresh N.O.C.
Photographs with a plain background. Nowhere it is mentioned in the passport office portal(s) that the photographs to be submitted for the purpose should have a plain (white or colourless) background. Then how can one know about it ? We submitted our applications with freshly taken photographs containing coloured background (the studio-waala also did not know that for the purpose of passports, photos should be taken with plain background) resulting in their rejection on this ground also (in addition to the one I am coming to).
The crowd at the passport office and their quota of 100 applications a day. When I visited the passport office, I found a queue longer than it could have been for water in a drought-hit Indian village. And despite the passport office (at Hyderabad) is to function till afternoon at least, very shortly (at 11 - 11.30 a.m.) the aspirants (including me) were told that they can go back because the quota of processing 100 applications a day by that office was complete and further applications would not be accepted that day (means go back and again stand in the queue the next day since the wee hours). I don't know whether the Ministry of External Affairs is aware of such (mal)practices in the passport offices of India or not. Anybody can guess that after the so-called quota of 100 applications, agents are entertained by the officials to warm own pockets alongwith filling the coffers of them.
And finally - address proof. Since we belong to Rajasthan and due to my changing the job a number of times over the past few years, we don't have voter cards for this place (or even our earlier place which was Delhi). Anyway, I am able to provide my proof of residence because of the landline telephone bill (of BSNL) and my salary account in the State Bank of Hyderabad. But what about the address proofs of my wife and mother ? My address proof is not accepted as the address proof of even my wife. I am astonished to find that in a country like India where the marital bond is considered so sacred, husband's address proof is not accepted as the address proof of his wife living with him. An agent advised me to open a bank account of my wife (and possibly of my mother also) in a nationalized bank because the address in the bank's record would be acceptable to the passport office. Well, I approached my bank (who is having my salary account with it) and asked to make it joint with my wife. The reply of the bank official shocked me because for making my own account joint with my wife also, he asked the proof of residence of my wife, independent of my address proof. Else, he asked me to furnish a copy of our marriage certificate which I cannot furnish because our marriage had taken place through the religious customs and it was not a civil marriage. I have been told by the passport agent that the affidavits regarding the proof of residence are also not accepted. Then how can my wife provide a proof of her residence ? Should husband's proof of residence not be considered as the proof of residence of an Indian wife ? And how can my mother provide a proof of her residence independent of my proof of residence ?
I am really confused and not able to find a way-out of this problem. In India, several rules and regulations are made without giving a thought to the problems of the straight citizens. That's how the menace of corruption goes unchecked because even to get the right things done, you have to route your work through the channel of bribe.