From steam engine age to bullet train (we'll skip the diesel age)

Wow, a bullet train for India on the cards. Cool. Thik hai, it is on paper, but still. At least we have started dreaming big. Well leaving aside the discussion on bullet train or diesel engine trains, I happen to visit a government office recently for personal work and boy! what an experience it turned out to be. It left me wondering are we still in steam engine age?

The place of my visit was Survey Office of Land Records Department in Dharwad. Unlike government offices in other places, this office has a group of 5-6 small buildings (more like small houses) nestled in a area of about 5 acres surrounded by trees. The moment I stepped inside their premise for the very first time I was really happy to notice that land records department has maintained and allowed trees to grow and not cut them for more office space. I had to get a plot belonging to my Mother surveyed so that it could be demarcated for future use. Having no idea on what is the process for this, I just went about thinking I could take the help of people around and get the work done.

Let me briefly detail the process here which I of course learned later on. It is an extremely simple and straight forward process. You go to Tashiladar's office, get the latest records of right document (which is entirely computerized for the benefit of citizens), staple it to an application form for the survey and submit it in survey office who provide you an acknowledgement with a survey number. So when your number comes up in the list you are called by the office and you need to accompany them at the said place and they will do the survey for you. Later a Property Identification Number (PID) is created that is tagged to the property as its identity, and that's it. Job is done. Simple as it seems, now that you know the process here is what I had to undergo to get the job done.......(not entirely though, I'm still following up for the PID!).

First, it is still amazing to know that close to 80% of the work for surveying the land is human dependent, i.e., there are no computer systems or GPS tools available. And even more amazing is the fact that where there are computer systems available, they do not benefit the citizens at all. The very first time I went to Tashildar's office to get the record of rights document, I had to wait 45 mins in the queue which had 6 people ahead of me and the lead time for issuing the document is less than 1 minute. So here is how a 5 mins job can take 45 mins with all computer systems in place. Dharwad is a place where power cuts are more than power supply. In that 45 mins that I stood in the line, 30 mins where consumed only because there were 4 power cuts and the remaining 10 mins was for the computer to boot every time the power went off. Imagine the frustration!!!

Speaking of computer systems, the Land record department has a separate building called the computer section. What happens in this building? I have no idea. Because in the entire duration I was running around for my work, not once did I have to go to this room. My curiosity about this room got the better of me when I saw people removing their slippers or shoes before getting inside the computer room. Aha! so they have deity inside to bless the work space. So I thought, but turns out these people have turned the computer boxes to demigod status. It is appalling to see that we are still living in a system where computers are revered (by revered I mean the box being given more value than human beings, read on...). And it saddens to see that they do not help the end customer, but serve only department work (hoping it does at least this!). Just outside this room is where you get the acknowledgement slips for survey fulfilment request. These people sit in dingy rooms with small desks, filled with stacks and stacks of papers on their desk and everywhere all across the room, rotting and covered with dust. The heat is unbearable and the stench of sweat and dust slips you in coma. All this just beside the room that is well lit, with air condition and white plaster (and of course with a note that states "Please leave your foot wear outside") where young chaps appear to convert manual to digital data. All millennials working off diligently. How I wished, these guys were handling the other side of the work also.

Getting the acknowledgement is just the first step of the process which does not guarantee anything. You still have a different irrelevant process of running around the office trying to figure out who needs to be requested (the term request over here is what is commonly known as bribe) to take the necessary action and get the survey completed. If you do refuse to request the concerned person, then the process is very simple. You wait until your number comes up for survey. My application was one among the thousands of applications that was dumped into the hay stack...I mean paper stack in the dingy room that I just described above.

This episode revelled a very stark picture of what actually happens in Tier 3 cities in India. It did leave a bitter taste in my mouth with all that I experienced, but at the same time the observation that all the people in the computer section were millennials and all others who appeared a drag on the system were nearing their retirement left a hope that things will change in very near future. I'm not of the intention that everyone older to my generation are a drag to the system, but there are a significant number (and this I can say with confidence after visiting two more government office's and Karnataka University recently in Hubli-Dharwad) of them who just refuse to understand that their way of working is done away with and they have to embrace change. What is more frustrating is that this minute population (in government offices specifically) calls the shots and act as a pain in the ass to the majority population of millennials in India.

Stating the process is 'entirely computerised' is one thing and supporting this statement with infrastructure, human resource training and systems reaching out to customer is another thing altogether (not just in the four metros Bangalore, Mumbai Chennai and Delhi but across Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities). So here's hoping the new government will derail the steam engine effectively after all and usher in the progress and changes required at bullet speed!