Excuse me, Sir, were you alive last month?
A retired government servant went to the treasury to withdraw his pension. At that time, a pensioner had to produce a certificate from a gazetted officer authenticating that he was alive during the month for which he claimed the pension. The retired servant also submitted an arrear bill for the previous month. The treasury officer agreed to pay him the pension for the month for which he produced the certificate but declined to pay him the arrears as he did not produce another certificate authenticating that he had also been alive during the previous month! The story, though old, reflects our clerical mentality that was implanted in our hearts and souls by the British Raj.
Years have passed but have we overcome the same mentality? Often my bank account is frozen. The reason is I do not update my account information. Every time I go to the bank, I am asked to fill out a new but huge account opening form and submit several documents. “I understand why I need to update my residence address and telephone numbers, if they are changed. But why is it necessary to update my date of birth and my parent's names? Do they also change from time to time?” Once I asked the manager. He was embarrassed. “This is a requirement by the Bangladesh Bank. We only follow their instructions,” he replied apologetically. I fill out the form in order to re-activate my account. It appears that the Bangladesh Bank has great ingenuity in inventing new forms periodically to make our life as difficult as possible. I cannot recollect how many times I updated information of the same account.
In this digital age, we are required to submit too many supporting documents for any official work even though most of the documents are available with them. Nobody is keen to dig files. Everyone wants readymade information. Most offices, banks in particular, have a tremendous appetite for passport-sized photos and copies of national identity cards and e-TIN certificates. No matter how many copies you make, they just vanish in no time! Instead of having one national identity card and a separate e-TIN certificate, can't we have only one digitized national identity card with all information (including the e-TIN) for all purposes to make life easier for us? Since the identity card contains a photograph, what is the necessity of additional photos?
I wonder when we shall get rid of our clerical mentality and the unnecessary paperwork.
The writer is a former chief engineer of Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission.
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