• I Paid A Bribe
  • 10 years ago
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Passport Verification Officer's Name: Sagar Jadhav Branch Sr. Inspector:…

Reported on September 4, 2014 from Pune , Maharashtra  ι Report #43220

Passport Verification Officer's Name: Sagar Jadhav
Branch Sr. Inspector: Machindra Chavan
From 19th July to 3rd September
Katraj Police Post, Pune

First Visit: Police officer messages to visit him for passport verification. So visited him the very next day. Upon visit the police officer directs to nearby photocopier for the verification form. Photocopier charged in excess of normal photocopy charges for the form (Rs, 10 for 8 pages while photocopy charges of Rs. 1 per page)

Second Visit: Carried all the necessary documents mentioned in English in the list of documents. Did not accept documents, gave some sham appointment asking to come next day but agreed to entertain later in the day after request short of begging.

Third Visit: Provided all the documents but the officer denied to accept. Said photo ID proof provided is only License, old passport not acceptable. Need pan card, voter ID card and adhar card. Also for address proof, even though there was no address change, other documents viz. purchase document, society letter and property tax receipt. And many more such documents for which I had provided one proof from multiple options. But he simply said all the proofs are required else I won't accept.

Fourth Visit: Provided optional documents as well. Officer denied to entertain as I did only took a phone appointment. He said "you are expected to come here and take appointment for when can you reach me"

By now I was pretty clear that he is doing all purposefully and would always come up with some excuse or another to not accept. But I did not wish to bribe him through. In the meanwhile I had to travel for work and contacted the officer after 3-4 days.

Fifth Visit: For taking his appointment. He started claiming how delayed I am and he is not going to accept the documents at all.

Now I had no recourse but provide for his needs as I was completely frustrated and had wasted huge amounts of time. Going to hire-ups won't help said fellow applicants.

Officer shamelessly asked for some money to accept the documents citing that he will be doing a favour to me for accepting the documents. Unfortunately I gave in. Slipped a Rs.500 note and he pounced on the note as well as the documents.

After accepting the documents and the money he was acting friendly now and said I will receive a call to come in person to sign on the same documents in presence of the Sr. Branch Inspector.

His assistant called on 6th August morning 10-10:30 asking to visit same day. Unfortunately I was out of town and requested her to entertain on 7th or 8th August. She said "Sir is going on leave from tomorrow" and banged the phone down. I called back from 9th August with no redressal on phone. I visited after 10 days assuming by now the officer must be back from leave.
The officer was there and denied taking the file forward saying you are late. We rejected your file and now nothing can be done.
I begged him how can he do that by giving few hours window? He said "I have dozen other things to do, I cannot care for you". This is the same guy who took Rs. 500 for accepting the documents.
This time I was not willing to pay any money and stayed in front of his office for two days for several hours, hoping that he would be shameful and do his job finally. In the meanwhile one of my acquaintances who is an ex CID officer visited the police officer and asked him not to harass me for money any more.
Fortunately he finally let me sign and forward the documents to the sr. inspector for his signature yesterday afternoon.

That's an ordeal one should never have to go if there are honest officers.

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