- I Paid A Bribe
- 9 years ago
- 437 views
Paid bribe for property transfer registration
- Municipal Services
- Registration of Property
- Paid INR 15,000
I bought an part,net in Mumbai and had to go to the property registration office at the Old Custom House. I went there at around 11:30am. My Lawyer had told me that I will need to pay bribe of Rs.15,000 to get the registration done. I told him that I will not pay, he immediately retorted that in that case I should be prepared to wait for days before registration is completed as the registration officials will find fault in my documents and keep me waiting and will keep delaying.
The seller being an elderly lady, I could not make do the rounds of the registration office as well and hence I succumbed to paying the bribe.
To my utter shock, the registration office is run by touts. My lawyer has his own tout and that guy immediately took our papers inside and within 10 minutes called us in for verification process. We managed to complete the entire process in under 30 minutes.
This is while there was a bunch of people who had been waiting when we walked in and there was a pile of files with the officials ( which I was told that these are held up because they have some fault) that were just kept on the side. I am surprised that the officials managed to peruse our documents in 10'minutes flat and that they were able to prioritize the same.
I was also shocked to see the kind of access that the touts have in this place, they were freely walking in and out of the registrars office.
I am ashamed for what I did and am hoping that this voice is heard. I even tweeted about it and tagged the CM, but have not heard back from him