Oh, for a new telephone connection…

Thank God that a night separates the day. And I hope tomorrow is not like today. Nope; my depressing state has nothing to do with the training I am delivering now. Well, I am delivering an Identity Manager training program (this time it is not IDM 345, but IDM 2525) at Sun Education Center, Bangalore. And in between, during the lunch break, I set out for an adventure. Before I talk about what the adventure, let me give you a oneliner background on the same. Of late, I have been thinking about a new telephone connection from BSNL (Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd.) so that I could take a broadband Internet connection at home. Having understood from the call center that the payment mode to get a new connection is only through a Demand Draft (they still live in some old century I believe), I went to my bank to make a demand draft. Unfortunately, the machine was non-functional (of course not the first time). Then I went to another bank, which has been in exsitence in our country for quite a long time now. Don’t they look very lazy out there? Yes, they did and it was really an experience in itself to get hold of a Demand Draft from there. Time then was 12:50 P.M. Took an auto and reached the BSNL office to submit an application form for a new connection. It was 1:10 P.M. then.I was told that they open only between 10:00 A.M. to 3:30 P.M. (a very convenient time for other employees to visit the BSNL office !!!). And I was the the last in the queue, which had only three people! The lady there at the counter was keying in the details from the application form to the computer very slowly and carefully. That’s understandable. I was getting a bit restless because I had to reach back the Sun lab at 2:00 P.M. for my afternoon session. At around 1:30 P.M. (well, exactly at 1:30 P.M. rather), that lady told me rather harshly to get back to her at 2:30 P.M. after her lunch break. I wonder whether she thought that the people who went to BSNL to submit the forms are unemployed and had no other work than sneaking in at the BSNL counters as and when they tell. By all means I had reached there much in advance to their lunch break and hence had all right to request her to spend another five minutes to accept my application form and give me the acknowledgement. She mercilessly rejected that. Well, I felt really annoyed and walked out of the BSNL office immediately. Well, who cares. Afterall they don’t get anything if a new connection is requested for.

I came back to my office and during the tea break wrote an E-mail to all reachable authorities at BSNL on this issue. I have absolutely no idea whether they would be generous enough to read through my E-mail at least. But I have decided to cancel my Demand Draft tomorrow and try to get a broadband connection from some other private companies who offer this service. I am sure they wouldn’t be harsh like this BSNL people. Having had this personal experience, it is no surprise to me now why these private parties are flourishing in our Nation in spite of allegations like hidden charges etc. Well, service matters. It’s high time that the Government organization learn about it and make appropriate amendments to their working model. Need some good sleep today to get over this frustration.