Officials’ apathy to finish formalities for Aadhaar cards leads to outrage among crowd.
Officials’ apathy led to outrage among those who waited for hours to finish the formalities for getting Aadhaar cards at a Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) centre near Bank of India in Banaswadi on Saturday.
Members of more than 20 families, including senior citizens and housewives, gathered at the centre before 12 pm. Being Diwali season, most of them took a break from their busy festival schedule to come to the centre to finish the formalities for Aadhaar cards. At 12:45 pm, officials told those who were standing in the queue that they are shifting to the second floor and asked them to come at 2.30 pm. Officials asked the crowd to come back later as they needed time to complete the shifting process. The officials also said they required a break to finish lunch.
The officials’ abrupt announcement about a break without informing those who were waiting in advance or putting up a notice, outraged the crowd. But a senior official said: “We can’t do anything. We have to shift. All of you go and come back after 2.30 pm”.
Oscar D’Souza, who was part of the crowd that waited to finish the formalities, said: “Many senior citizens have come here. They have been standing in the queue for more than 45 minutes. You should have displayed the lunch timing and other details outside at the venue. How can you ask us all of a sudden to go away?”.
The official callously replied, saying that: “We know that there are senior citizens but we cannot do anything. We need to have our lunch.”
When a youth came forward to enquire about office timing, the official asked: “Don’t you know the office timing? Which office do you work in?” The official informed the youth about the timing only after the latter said that different offices follow varied timings.
An elderly woman who was standing in the queue said: “I have been coming for the last three days. They said some documents are not proper. But they did not tell me what the alternative is.”
Another outraged youth asked the officials: “Is this the way you conduct yourselves? The lunch timing is 45 minutes. You are asking us to come back after one-and-half hours. You didn’t even put up a note outside the centre indicating the timing.”
Saying that putting up a note indicating the timing is a good idea, a senior official instructed a junior employee to display office timing outside the venue. The junior official took 10 minutes to write the timing in a piece of paper and display it outside the centre.
Infuriated by the delay, the people refused to leave the venue until the formalities are over. “We have left our work and come here. We will not go. You finish the process for the people who are standing here,” they insisted.
Sticking to their guns, the officials said: “We want to have lunch. You go and come back after the lunch.” But seeing that the crowd was not ready to go back, the officials finally agreed to finish the formalities for these who were already waiting.
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