Passport Application - The Preparation

One of my New Year resolutions, and latest endeavor in a self exploration voyage is to restart my writing. So this blog is the starting place for my experiments with writing.

The latest happening in my life is my passport application. My previous passport had got damaged due to water seepage which rendered my photograph into a noseless, 2 black dots for eyes, vaguely outlined face. Not a good thing for a document that is one of the critical ways for photo identification. I had been planning to apply for a new one for a while. This need got excaberated with my marriage, or rather my decision (after much agonizing post marriage) of what to do with my surname. I finally settled on a double barrelled mouthful keeping my maiden name as my middle name. This created a need for my personal documentation to be changed. For any personal documents to be changed, we needed to register our marriage, which we finally did after 5 years of marriage!! That done, I had enough documents to support my name change and could go in for the next level of document changes...those defining my identity in the eyes of the government, official agencies and life at large.

Even then, the bureaucratic procedure, the tedious supporting documents requirements, the application process itself made me keep postponing the inevitable. Till one day we decided, we wanted to go on a nice vacation somewhere. Now I really needed a passport!

Thus began the process of document gathering. Hubby found a person who advised us on the documents to be collected. Armed with that list, I scoured through our vaguely organised and much scattered personal papers. Here is what I needed as enclosures to my form.

1. My birth certificate (of which I only had a copy)
   
2. Proof of address - Phone bill, Bank statement. I later realised (when I was standing in the application submission line!) that only nationalised bank statements work. Luckily, I needed only 1 proof and the phone bill worked. Now the phone bill is a story in itself. We have 3 mobiles and 2 landline numbers for 2 people! Earlier we had the state owned BSNL phone and net. But the net service was dismal. Hubby works for a conglomerate, one of whose main companies is a telecommunications company. So he got their phone and net at a better price. The net connection was far better too. This was after our building society first went for the BSNL option after much deliberation, and after a few months, felt compelled to add the other option due to better service, but I digress. Anyway, so we got the new connection and removed the earlier net connection. We wanted to remove the earlier phone too till I realised it is the ONLY proof I have that is admissible in various government agencies as a valid proof of residence!! The ONLY one! So the connection remained, and with it, my proof that I really DO live here.
   
3. Proof of educational qualifications - 10, 12th, graduation, post grad - marksheet and certificates. Which is when I realised I never collected my graduation certificate and was living with a provisional one. But combined with my marksheet it would work, so I was fine on that.
   
4. Proof of marriage - Marriage certificate, husbands passport copies and a joint affidavit for name change. This was the first of affidavits required and luckily the lawyer who had helped with our registration had already got it done. But this was the only relief. Soon I realised for the next few days, affidavit would be my sole purpose in life!
5. Police complaint (in original) for damaged passport. Another little story within a story. Luckily the police station is right next door, so one balmy afternoon, I loaded up my papers and walked to it requesting a complaint to be lodged against my damaged passport so I could apply for another. The officer looked at my passport, looked at me, contemplated on life for a while, looked back at me, asked me again what was it exactly that I wanted? A police complaint lodged against my damaged passport etc. etc. I produced the passport. Hmm...it looks ok. No sir, the photo is distorted. For a photo identity document, it wouldnt do! Luckily, another customer/ complainant who was standing there supported my claim. Hmm... said the officer, let me check on this. Then he disappeared into the deeper regions of the police station with my passport as I cooled my heels. Suspenseful moments passed. He emerged after a while with my passport. You need an affidavit stating your passport is damaged and requesting for an FIR. Huh? Before I could say anything, the bystander customer (standing with an affidavit of his own) told me how easy it was to get one, just a few rupees, a bit of time, stamp paper, visit to a court, etc. etc. I beat a hasty retreat. Got the affidavit done (another story later in this post) and reached the police station with alacrity a couple of days later. The same officer was there, and he said all was ok. Then he asked another person to write the report. This person hemmed, hawed, came up with a million problems and hesitated with a lot of doubt and stubborness on writing the report. The Investigating Officer has to give the go ahead first, he said. I looked on in perplexed resignation one gets on dealing with official bureaucrats who hold your life purpose in their hands and look for red tape to strangle it with. Luckily, the initial officer (who told me to get the affidavit) took it upon himself to get the job done. I was asked to sit as he disappeared once again into the mysterious regions of the building. More suspense. Some (actually a fair bit) minutes later, he emerged with another person, who turned out to be an investigating officer in plain clothes. He asked me a number of question, how did it get damaged, when, why, why do I need a complaint, who am I, what do I do, what does my husband do etc. etc. After multiple questioning (much of it repetitive) he was satisfied and gave the go ahead for the complaint to be written. The writing official STILL had doubts. What should I write? Who will authorize? Whose name is it against? etc. etc. At this point the Investigating Officer pointed to the affidavit, and told him to get on with it. FINALLY! After a few ponderous moments of writing, trying to find errors of comission and omission in the affidavit, sadly for him finding none, he finished the complaint and gave it to me. I could have collapsed in relief, but I waited till I got home to do so!
6. The Affidavits - Bane of my life. Luckily, hubby had a person who would get them done so all I had to do was provide the drafts. An affidavit for verifying who I am, one for saying my passport is damaged and apologising profusely while accepting any further carelessness can attract legal action, and one for the police to please lodge a complaint. The first two drafts luckily were available in the application form and the passport online site. However, the real pain was figuring out which affidavits were needed, and finding out their requirements at scattered moments of document collection. Hence, multiple visits for affidavit creation were required. Pain, pain, pain!
7. Lastly, a document from a senior government servant verifying who I was etc. etc. in given format, on their letter head, with my photo and a copy of their ID card. Sigh! Luckily, my parents are in the government, and though they could not due to direct relation do the verification, they have enough friends who could. I contacted one of them, and on a visit to my parent's house (on the solemn occasion of the passing away of my grandmother a few days back), I cornered him, settled my hubby on the photocopier and got the documents done. This document is required for passport to be applied under Tatkal scheme, where you get you passport within a speedy 7-10 days of application and the normal police verification is done after issue of passport, based on the verification of the senior government servant.

Phew! All documents in place. After 3 weeks of running around, we felt prepared to apply. We checked with the agent who told us, application would have to be in person. The passport office is walking distance from my parents' place, so we took full use of that convenience and landed up on Sunday, to spend a day there and be ready early morning to queue up for the passport application process. We had been told to queue up by 8:30am so that we got an early number and got the stuff done quickly. Finally, it all seemed to be coming together.

As we prepared to get to my parents' place, I realised I'd made some dumb errors in the application. Why o Why!! Hubby said we'll white-ink and correct it. So we reached my parent place and asked for white ink. Thats precisely what I'm looking for, said Dad. What? Where is it? Somewhere it seemed where it could not be easily found. So, that evening, Dad, hubby, Nero our dog and I all walked to the market to buy some white ink, and provide Nero with some feverish street dog barking and part chasing, I-top-dog-here-who-the-hell-are-you diversions. Back home, I corrected my form, found 2 more mistakes, corrected those too, mentally deskbanged my head and finished the form. Put everything into the envelop and then endeavoured to do something else than this whole consuming obsession of completing my passport form. Tomorrow will be a big day!