|
ECONOMIC
GRAFFITI
Soliciting
In Public
Step
into a time-warped public office to find out what ails our legal system
By
Kaushik Basu
Last
week I went to a notary public in Ithaca, New York, to have my signature
on a document attested. I had phoned in advance and when I stepped into
her office, she guessed, "Professor Basu?" In about 10 minutes
I was out of there, the job completed. As I drove back to Cornell I could
not help feeling impressed by the efficiency. But I must admit, there
was also a feeling of nostalgia for India.
 Last
August my wife and I had to get a document notarised in Delhi. Dodging
a procession of banner-waiving protesters of some sort near the crossing
of Sansad Marg and Ashoka Road, we entered an open area-resembling what
I imagine the bazaars of ancient Babylon must have looked like during
the decline of the Mesopotamian civilisation-where the notaries public
keep their offices. "Offices" here mean a cluster of ramshackle
desks and chairs beneath makeshift sheds. Right in front of this arena
is a garbage dump, with additions to it appearing like missiles every
now and then from an adjacent building. Chai wallahs and peons weave their
way through the rows of desks, where an assortment of men in black coats
sit, some working, some staring vacantly and some dozing.
We were
in a hurry and so we thrust the document into the hands of the first notary
we came across, a man who was somewhere between staring vacantly and dozing.
"Not like this. Everything has to be done in proper order,"
he cried, annoyed by our haste. Those words brought into existence an
assistant with a Dev Anand hairdo, who took the paper from us and gave
it to "Mr Sharma". During the course of that afternoon we discovered
that that was the only job of "Dev Anand", and every notary
public seemed to have one such person.
We were
told to return after an hour.
"One
hour to type so little?"
I got the
notary's gaze. "Sir, notary work is no faaltu work. It has
to be done properly."
When we
returned over an hour later, the document was lying exactly where we had
left it. I could not help being angry, but Mr Sharma was unruffled. "Kindly
understand. Only we are not taking lunch, typist is also eating (sic)."
To contest that would sound too mean, so my wife and I sat on the two
chairs that Dev Anand had produced, before vanishing with the document
"to get it typed".
We were
there for the next two hours, watching the ebb and flow of this Kafkaesque
theatre. The monotonous clatter of old-fashioned typewriters would fade
into the background every time a customer lost his patience. The humid
heat of August worsened frayed nerves. "You keep mum," shouted
one notary to another, with the latter responding with dignity, "Rather,
you keep mum."
After an
hour a lady in salwar kameez and white sports keds came to Mr Sharma to
have a signature verified. Dev Anand intercepted and gave the papers to
Mr Sharma. Her husband had lost his BA degree and the Delhi University
(DU) office had instructed her to bring a letter from him, with a notary
public's attestation saying he had lost it.
But where
was the husband who would have to sign it? She explained they were NRIs
and her husband could not come to India; but she could "write"
his signature. As I warmed to the thought of witnessing a forgery being
notarised, I realised corruption was not among Mr Sharma's failings. He
insisted her husband would have to come to his office. "But he's
in Vancouver," she pleaded. This went on for a while, till I, to
break the stalemate, suggested she could type out a letter saying her
husband had lost his BA degree and that she would like to collect a duplicate
on his behalf.
After a
short silence or perhaps a nap Mr Sharma said, "The suggestion is
not without merit." I later felt quite guilty for I just could not
see the hardened bureaucracy of DU issuing a duplicate degree to some
lady who comes with a letter saying she was the wife of the person who
had lost his degree.
Anyway she
was quite cheerful. She berated Mr Sharma for the dump in front of his
desk, which, she assured him, would never happen in Vancouver.
"Everywhere
there is garbage," countered Mr Sharma, "even in Kashmir."
It was not clear why he thought such a thing would be particularly unexpected
in Kashmir.
"Have
you been to Kashmir?" I queried.
"I
would not speak about any place unless I had been there and seen with
my own eyes."
A little
later the Vancouver lady mused there was too much corruption in Delhi.
"Why only Delhi?" countered Mr Sharma with his unerring Delhi-loyalty,
"There is corruption even in Russia." "Have you been to
Russia?" she asked. "No, never," he replied, slightly annoyed,
"How can you go to every country?"
(The
author is professor of economics at Cornell University.)
Top
|
Orthodoxy in economic thought is as odious as obscurantism in the socio-religious context. INDIA TODAY Associate Editor, V Shankar Aiyar, offers a contrarian take on the stock markets and the cause and the impact of policy and practice. 