Reality Check

It was a Wednesday in the last week of November 2008. I was as usual on some networking site trying to hunt for contacts of some Alumni or Student activist of a premium college in India.

Today was a little different because I was not at all with myself. My mother in Goa was sick and temporarily bed ridden and the impact of the Global meltdown was weighing on my mind.

Life has been always like this with me so it did not come up as a surprise when Hima my boss called me to her rooms and told me to get ready for my first international assignment – Dubai.

I must confess here that although I was internally very excited, I did think this was possible. I am a bit of a travel freak but always thought of international travel as a huge hassle. I firmly believed that India had a lot of places that I needed to explore yet. Most of my friends and family thought I was taking up the ‘grapes are sour’ line even before trying.

Any way I reluctantly walked up to the ISB travel desk to understand the formalities. First and foremost I needed a passport that was valid up to six months from the date of travel. To be honest I did not even know where my passport was. I asked Usha at home to check about my passport. In a few minutes Usha called to inform that my passport expires on March 24th 2009.
I spoke to many agents and officials that evening and tried to reason with them but it was of no use.

This simply meant I needed to renew my passport in the next two days and after that go and apply for a Visa which would take another 3 to 4 days. Knowing the formalities involved I realised that any task that has to deal with a Government department in India is not going to be simple.

Moreover being an arrogant Bombay boy who never wanted anything to do with Hyderabad, I never bothered to get any of my documents transferred. I had no proper address proof of a place I had been staying for the last 4 years and all my identity proofs were like me Bombay based.

My first reaction next morning was to get my passport renewed from Bombay. I thought this would be easier than to deal with a situation in Hyderabad. However, when I spoke to agents and officials in Bombay and Hyderabad, I realised this was not possible. I had been staying in Hyderabad for too long to be recognised at least officially as a Bombay boy.

For a ‘tatkal’ passport renewal in Hyderabad I needed 3 documents as proof of residence or a Verification Certificate from an IAS/ IPS cadre government officer who knew me in person. I had a telephone bill of a reliance FWP/ land line but no other proofs to prove that I was resident in Gachibowli Hyderabad for the last 4 plus years. I thought I knew no government officer.

Finally I gave up. I picked up the phone and spoke to Usha and said to her that we need to do a ‘reality check.’

Usha never gives up so easily. In a consoling tone she heard me out but gave me her trump card ideas as usual. She has a few tricks up her sleeves and as always she told me to do a few things that will work for me.

Usha reminded me that we had a Bharat Gas Connection and I could get my address on my bank account changed. This would give me the 3 ‘address proofs’ if we include the telephone bill. She also reminded me of a certain acquaintance of mine who worked with the income tax department. I vaguely remembered that he was a very high ranking officer.

She immediately also asked me to register online for a passport appointment in Hyderabad and get myself clicked.

I did as she said and spoke to my friend in the income tax department the next morning. To my delight things started to fall in place. My friend checked and realised that he was entitled to give me the Verification Certificate. He also decided to accompany me to the passport office as he knew some top official there.

In just 2 days my passport was in my hand and Usha still taunts me about the ‘Reality Check.’