An interesting incident

Hi All,

More than a month back, I travelled from Bangalore to Chennai by a Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation [KSRTC] bus. I was carrying some luggage with me and had promptly left it in the luggage compartment as per the instruction of the driver. The driver collected Rs 500 from me for the luggage and promised me a receipt at the end of the journey.

I kept pestering the driver and conductor for a receipt throughout the journey but to no avail. They just gave me some frivolous excuses and boomeranged my requests every time.  I was pretty perturbed by their behavior but could not do much due to the fear of being thrown off the bus. At the end of the journey neither the driver nor the conductor made any effort to issue a receipt. The driver just returned Rs 150 to me and stated that Rs 350 was the ‘charge’ for the luggage!

Upset with the proceedings, I decided to take up this matter. I shot a mail to the complaint email stated in the KSRTC website. Truth be told, I wasn’t holding my breath. C’mon this is India.. a place where even physical complaints don’t get investigated and now you are expecting a virtual complaint to be taken seriously..get real dude!! I wouldn’t blame you if that was what you were thinking. My fear that my complaint will go unattended was further cemented when I did not even get an auto reply acknowledging my email.  So this probably was an email which is not monitored at all.

Days went by and hope receded like a low tide. I thought of sending a 2^nd email or perhaps calling them up. But the realist inside me started taking charge to ensure no such thing would happen. Just when I thought all hope was lost, I received a call from a person who claimed to be a ‘case officer’ from KSRTC. He informed me that my case was looked into and was found to be genuine. He further informed me that since no receipt was issued, KSRTC was willing to refund the money I paid for the luggage. Again I was not holding my breath but to my surprise I did receive a refund from them a couple of hours later! A week later I received an email from the Divisional Traffic Officer, Bangalore Central Division. I am reproducing the email below verbatim.

Sir,

                Re: Your email complaint has been verified in detail

We are in receipt of your email complaint dated 28^th August 2012. The matter has been examined in detail. Necessary disciplinary action has been taken against the driver who performed duty on that day. And the conductor of the vehicle is suitably warned and instructed to behave politely with passengers. Sorry for the inconvenient caused to you on that day and continue to travel in KSRTC buses in future also.

Regards,

Divisional Traffic Officer,

Bangalore Central Division

I have been reflecting on this incident the past few weeks. It seems to be that the game changer in all this is technology. It was an online complaint that made me approach the KSRTC people in the first place. I wouldn’t fancy myself standing in a derelict government office full of cynical officers discouraging you from the launching a complaint. Let bygones be bygones sir…Probably a bad day for you…Locating that office itself would be quite a challenge and even I were to find it, we all know where complaint papers go the second we leave. Straight to a dust filled cabinet never to be opened again. So technology brings convenience.

Additionally, being physically present at an office exposes me to retaliatory attacks from the very people I am complaining against. Who is to say these people don’t have friends on the inside. So technology offers yet another thing: anonymity

Finally, accountability also comes into the picture. I have a proof of the email and the relevant people/department cannot refuse in the future that they did not receive a complaint or lost it somehow. So the government officer looking into this case has to account for this complaint and the consequent action (if any) was taken.

It is clear that infusion of technology into governance has several benefits for the citizenry. I really hope that the amateur steps taken by our central government and state governments see their logical conclusion.

P.S. Not sure if I need to say this..but I am going to anyway…

In the interest of full disclosure, I am in IT professional so I have a positive bias towards technology. Also, deeper penetration of technology into governance would benefit me, albeit indirectly and in a minuscule manner.