When you need a passport in Delhi…

Hakeem Irfan

“Just get the photocopy of your passport, identity card, address of the hotel you are staying at, with your permanent address; then you can avail the services.”
It was not the list of requirements at an immigration office, police station, airport authority or any other enquiring agency. These were the pre-requisites to make an STD call from New Delhi to Kashmir, on a telephone booth in December 2008.

Just after my entry in a PCO in New Delhi, last month, the owner cast a glance at my face and said, “STD is defunct, ISD is out of service and for a local call you can go to the next shop.” After this he continued to surf the channels on his LG color TV. I wonder why he had opened the booth that day if nothing was working.

Moving to the next booth had an extra shock for me. As I peeped from the window of the shop, a fat man in his mid forties sitting on the half rugged chair said, “Write name, address and all the personnel details in the register that is lying there on the shelf. Give me your identity proof and also a local reference.” I jotted down every thing as I had to make the call. The family in Kashmir would have been too worried about my arrival in the metropolis.Soon all my ‘jottings’ went waste when the owner said, “Now you can make a local call only.” It was seriously getting into my head now. But I had no choice. I called my friend in Delhi and asked him to call my home. Inform them about my safe arrival in the city hosting Common Wealth Games in couple of years!

For a Kashmiri, being in the metropolitan has always been a worried thing. Being now a member of the fourth estate I thought this time around things might be different. I never knew that it is going to be the same old story.

The scenes of the Mumbai attack were still lingering around in the atmosphere. I, as a Kashmiri, was probably feeling it more than anybody else. Besides, the way advertisement and TRP savvy news channels broadcast the whole event, had strengthened the usual suspect theory and occupied the common man’s mind.

Soon I realized that the Indian currency had devalued more to the limits that I would have never imagined. A Kashmiri was not getting the accommodation even after paying extra bucks for an ordinary room in a below average hotel. Money was Indian, they all could see, but it was in a Kashmiri pocket. Disputed! How much they needed to be paid, didn’t matter. Who was to pay it, mattered! At this economy, I was completely at loss. Probably this might be the real meaning of Political Economy!

Finally, I could arrange a room in a decent hotel. I had to call a local acquaintance who suggested me to go this hotel. The manager in the hotel was a friend of my acquaintance. Still I had to hand over my identity card, and which ever proof I had, to the manager, so that he could Xerox it and keep of a copy of.Some surprises were yet to spring. Two hours later the bell of my room rang. A person entered with a camera, wearing a smile; ‘Sir! Can we take your photograph, please!?” I thought this is a unique way of welcome. But the camera person said, “This is for the security reasons.” I was amazed, but could not afford to lose the accommodation. Then I suggested them to take a blood sample as well! But he refused saying, “Sir, the system here is not that much advanced.”

Surfing the internet was a Herculean task. Three net café owners refused to render the services. Finally, I again had to ink all my details, submit the photocopy of my identity card, local reference, hotel address at one of the cafés. Still I had to give the password of my email account to the owner. He was more interested in going through my inbox. This was embarrassing but I was expecting an email from my brother about the books and CDs he wanted me to purchase for him. I had to reveal my password which was no more a password. Failword!

My stay in the expanding conurbation had a baggage of experiences. From the celebrity of the Bollywood to a first class executive, from a Professor in the elite University in Delhi to a senior Army official, I met during my stay, everyone was nurturing the sensational and subjective notions vis-a-vis Kashmir. Although there were exceptions but then the black denies freedom to any other color to express itself.