Friday, February 11, 2011

A day in life at RTO

I, had the luxury of spoiling my smart card driving licence issued by RTO Gujarat State and upon enquiry was told that physically an individual needs to be present for obtaining a duplicate.

Earlier when I, had obtained the existing driving license, I had visited only the driving school and presto the driving license was handed over to me (only for formality sake had visited the RTO).

However I, was informed currently this practice has stopped and it is not possible to get it done through an agent as stringent and regular checks are in place, so I along with my colleague irritatingly reached Ahmedabad RTO only to find a huge queue already.

Reluctantly, grudgingly, or rather painfully we decided to endure the long queue, however during this ordeal I, had opportunity to observe a few interesting facts which made me ponder, even in such adversities how mankind looks for opportunities remember Sir Albert Einstein had quoted "In adversity lies opportunity."

In order to beat the heat, we had salesmen or rather sales women selling water in small pouches of Re. 1 each and for tea lovers like me, we had vendors selling tea, to idle our time groundnuts were being sold for munching, and while observing all the above suddenly I, could spot rag pickers coming to pick the empty plastic water pouches for re-selling it to vendors.

A gentleman came to sell smart looking covers for keeping the Smart Card intact without getting spoilt, another gentleman walked in with a pack of visiting cards specifying an address of nearby shop and urging people to laminate their old or new smart cards guaranteeing a longer shelf life.

A realisation dawned on me that a whole lot of entrepreneurial activities do happen around us without us, even realising it or that matter even the RTO authorities would not have realised how much entrepreneurship they must have generated.

This particular experience was unique; I could never imagine such experience could come from these sets of people. Here I, wish to borrow the words of the ancient Roman philosopher, Horace: “Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents, which in prosperous circumstances would have lain dormant”.

Luxury was mentioned in the first line because it gave me a good learning

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