---------------------------------------------------------------------------
**** http://www.GOANET.org ****
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Goanet joins Noel Rebello to raise money for Daddy's Home (Margao, Goa)
Sponsor Noel as he climbs Mt. Kilimanjaro (5,882m or 19,298 ft)
Make a donation at www.Goanet.org, click on MAKE A DONATION,
state "Daddy's Home" in the Donation comments
For more information see: http://bit.ly/SupportDaddysHome
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Despite the title, nobody has been able to decisively tell us what the horror
of
so-called dual citizenship is. One individual forgot to carry his old US
passport wherein the offical OCI sticker was attached, and was quite correctly
pulled up by the Immigration authorities. His
fault ! Other than that I have not read about anyone else having a problem.
Yet this thread has taken on a life of its own. The OCI document is a godsend
to those of us who have taken foreign citizenship. It recognizes that we still
have ties to our motherland and allows us hassle free entry into India. Kudos
to the Indian Government for giving us this special privilege.
Bureaucrats are often a harried lot and as humans they react to the pressures
and demands of their job. Some are downright crooks and try to extract
bribes. I can say with a straight face that I have never paid a bribe, but in
hindsight, in some encounters with Goan bureaucrats they were probably trying
to
get me to grease their palms.
I was to niaive to realize it at the time, and had to dance to their merry tune.
I have come across several, efficient, helpful and honest bureaucrats. Once
when obtaining a
drawing of my property, I was so grateful for the help I received, courteously
and efficiently, that after the work was done, I tried to give a little
"bakshish" to the lady who attended to my work. She politely refused to take it.
Recently, I had to look up some very old birth records at the Archives office
in
Panjim. The young man who helped me was so kind. He went through the books
and
showed me a comment written there in, that the records for the particular year
were not available as the pages were frayed. Seeing my disappointment, he
consulted someone, and then went out of his way to another level of the
building
and was able to extract a Xerox copy of the very frayed but still decipherable
record that I was looking for. He went well above and beyond the call of
duty.
I immediately went to his supervisor and commended the young man who helped
me.
Hopefully my comments will pay dividends to him in his career.
Despite a few bad apples, there are some kind, efficient and helpful people in
Goa's bureaucracy.
