I was never into applying for any award, memberships or recognition because I feel that we should not apply or influence someone to get recognized and till now I hold the same ground. I feel recognition should come from the work you do not by lobbying or by knowing someone. As I see more and more people recognized by their contribution to a certain field I fail to find where the real contribution is. In India, if one wins one award, they also win all others one after the other. Because one recognition gets some visibility that drives the other and so on. Now, I take a pause and would like to ponder over the quality of the people who determine who should be awarded. Do they read enough papers, do they update themselves with the technology OR they are part of some gossip club where science and technology is gossiped and hearsay determines the future. Recently, 75 women were celebrated for their contribution in STEAM. Now I am wondering where are their contributions hiding. Who has decided that. Sadly, I see many distinct names missing who are in a much better place to be nominated rather than the people who adorn this list. I feel it is time, we stop celebrating such successes and stop spreading lies, give promotions and recognition to such people if we really want to enhance our science.
Sunday, March 6, 2022
Friday, January 14, 2022
Getting a driver's license in Kolkata
Thanks to Nitin Gadkari ji's initiative, now there is a national portal for obtaining a driver's license. The site to visit is https://vahan.nic.in/nrservices/ . There you register your intent to get yourself a driver's license.
I have made one 20 years back in Bangalore in 2001. There, I remember, there was a written test conducted where we took paper and pen and wrote the test in a room. The results were declared almost immediately. Subsequently, there was a small buffer time within which one needed to give road the test. It was indeed a road test, where one has to drive on the road with real vehicles and animals and humans all around. Both the tests were fair so to say and I passed the road test in the second attempt (failed the first one: Another long story. Road test was going fine till a dog appeared suddenly out of nowhere. I stopped the car and could not start due to nervousness) and got a license for 20 years (Till 2021). So, I was wondering whether to go for a renewal or take a fresh test. Taking a fresh one seemed more appropriate. So, we filled the forms and submitted the documents online. Our test dates were scheduled and the time slot was also scheduled. The date of written test, we had to go to the DMV (Kasba). They verify the papers (mainly Adhaar card and address proof etc.). Then an OTP is generated that has the login and password information for the written test. One can get the photograph taken digitally and get the signature digitally registered in the same office at the same time by standing in another queue. After that, using the login and password, one can go for the computerized test. Note: If you happen to go anytime other than your scheduled slot, the system will not take you. For this test, there are many online study materials one can find. I find this link very useful: https://indianauto.com/tips/guidelines-on-getting-loan-against-your-car-nid6418 . Once I started answering the multiple choice questions, I get to see my scores. The moment the scores are more than 50% of the total mark, you don't have to proceed any further. You will immediately get an OTP that you have cleared the Lerner's permit. At that point of time, you can also go to the Vahaan site and download the learner's permit.
Regarding the road test, there is a buffer time (usually between a month to 6 months) within which you have to go and give the road test (here the road test does not mean actual road test. Only a small place marked for going forward and reverse to complete the test). So, on our scheduled date and time, we went for the test. Unfortunately, the place is extremely crowded and chaotic and an unsuspecting mind will not be able to figure out what to do. After several rounds of asking we figured out that there is a place where the car has to go 100 meters forward and 100 meters reverse to test driving. That is it. We somehow managed to go near the test site. They were letting the driving school people to precede everyone else. After waiting for a couple of hours, I went and asked the MVI when they are going to take our test. They said, you just wait. After the driving school is done, you can give your test. But I protested. So they made me write an application that I need to give test in our own vehicle. [Another alert, always carry plain paper, pen, staplers and glue stick if you are going to any such places to avoid un-necessary hassles.] I did just that and then they allowed us to give the test. The test lasted for 2 minutes. After the test, they signed on the document and wrote "passed". They said nothing. I was wondering if the test is done, is that it or we needed to wait longer and what paper to give what to take. Nada - nothing no communication. We waited and saw what the driving school was doing. They handed over bulk paper and per candidate they were paying the MVI 200 INR. We were not sure what was that for though. They did ask us 200 rupees in sign language but we ignored. We did not realize that we had to take the copy of the page signed as passed before handing them over. Since we didnot pay any extra money, we were not certain whatever will happen to our recently "passed" trophy paper. We handed over all the documents to them "without taking copy" and were extremely anxious about this. Then the waiting started.
We were checking the web site for the status. On the web site, it showed us that ground test is conducted and road test is awaited. We were wondering what is that next road test is all about. In front of our eyes so many driving school people zoomed in and out with the 2 minutes test. Do we have to give another test? Since we did not have copy of the "pass" signed paper neither did we pay that 200 rupees, we were very anxious. Just like that one week passed has and the status on the web site did not change. Then we decided to visit the DMV personally to see what is happening there. To our surprise, even if there are some automation, but the human components are slow and there are no accountability there. Even if someone i sitting at one place, there are no system is check whether the paper actually moved. After waiting in DMV for several hours, we discovered that there was a saint like person called "Bablu da" who does work selflessly. It is rare to find such people in government offices. Even though I work for the government, I still have this impression about all things government. We approached him and he pulled out the file and took our paper (among the few unfortunate ones who still did not show up at DMV) and put it in front of the signing authority. We got an OTP to our phone and could download the provisional drier's license from the web site. Now the status is pending at the "printing" stage. We don't know when that is going to happen and whether we need to discover another Bablu da who will escalate the printing of the license. By the way, we had driving test on 21st Dec 21 and got the approval on 28th Dec 21. So long as this is a valid document we are not approaching anyone...
Altogether we have paid Rs. 550 as fee and not spend anything else for the whole thing...