“It took me one month to get a residence certificate,” says an elderly man from Loutolim as he waits in line to submit documents for his wife’s residence certificate at the South Goa Collectorate in Margao housed in the building named after Matanhy Saldanha. This senior citizen who wished to stay anonymous said two months ago, he had had to wait for a month to get the certificate which he needs to collect the Rs. 2,000 under the Dayanand Social Security Scheme (DSS).
This time it took the office 15 days to process his wife’s papers. “I got an SMS telling me the certificate was ready. This way it becomes so much easier. I don’t have to constantly come every now and then to check on the status. Even the affidavits can be done here,” he says as he sorts through copies of his wife’s birth, income, education and bonafide certificate along with the ration card and election card that he needs to submit at this office.
All of this happens on the second floor of the complex as staff direct people to counters where certificates of residence, caste, income, mutations and divergence are issued making it one of the busiest offices in the building. A minimum of 50 applications are received at these counters in a day. Depending on the time of year, the numbers can go much higher.
May and June are the busiest, says one staff member. This is because students queue up for residence and sometimes caste certificates. The rest of the year, only the announcement of a new scheme gets people queuing in long lines.
Up on the third floor, a constant buzz of people dressed in black and white can be seen coming from the deputy collector’s office. The reason: cases pertaining to the Mundkar Act. A middle aged man walks with his advocate holding a plastic bag of documents as they talk of the next step in their case of acquiring rights to the land of the bhatkar that has been going on in the Mamlatdar’s court for some months.
Venancio Furtado, Collector South Goa says that according to law, mundkars have a right to 300 sq metres area from the bhatkars. The presence of advocates isn’t necessary.
“In many cases, the mundkars are not very rich people, but they still hire high costing advocates to fight their case to match the bhatkars. Many times, these cases can be easily sorted out at the Mamlatdar’s office without the need of advocates at all,” he says.
A little further, around the corner, a young man is busy talking on his phone. “Make sure everything is in place. He is coming for the inspection now,” he says in Konkani, referring to the engineer due to inspect his property for the occupancy certificate, as he instructs the person at the other end of the line to keep Rs 500 in his pocket. The Block Development Officer (BDO) is the issuing authority for the occupancy certificates.
Furtado admits that people do give bribes to officers. “If, for example, you have an 8 x 6 mt plot with the plan showing three rooms but in reality you go and build four rooms, as long as it is within the 8 x 6 plan, you have done nothing wrong,” he says.
It is easy to lose your way among the four floors of South Goa’s Collectorate located near the Kadamba bus stand. But signs to offices at almost every location come as a major relief to those who want to meet officials from the district administration.
In Panjim’s Collectorate opposite the ferry junction, Mamlatdars are busy dealing with cases of cancellation of name from ration cards to property issues.
A lady at the entrance to the building sits with a pen and correction ink in hand as people ask her for help to fill out forms and generally enquire where to go do get their work done.
The control room here rings with someone on the line claiming an illegal construction is underway in of Taleigao. The flying squad rushes to the scene inspecting paper work and licenses for construction only to realize a compound wall was being built illegally.
When the squad reported the matter to the office, the Mamlatdar then issued a stop cause notice that forced the party from continuing with the construction. Duties of the Collectorate are not merely limited to administration and land revenue issues but law and order as well.
Further into the building, the election cell is busy sorting through names of people who turned 18 as of January 2014 to add to the electoral roll. “The cell does not activate only during election time but is constantly updating itself. From adding new names to removing those who have died and weeding out duplicates, the process is ongoing all year round,” says recently appointed Collector Nila Mohanan.
Public participation says Mohanan is something she intends on building in North Goa. “I’ve seen that the people here in Goa are very well informed and generally don’t jump to conclusions,” she says. But in some rural talukas like Bicholim for example, people do get conned.
On one of her surprise inspections to Bicholim she found lawyers and notaries sitting in small kiosks issuing affidavits charging people as much as Rs 500. At the Mamlatdar’s office however, only a sum of Rs 50 for the stamp is charged for the affidavit that follows a similar pattern already predefined.
This office like many of Goa’s other government offices also plans on using technology to simplify people’s lives. “We are currently working on having a system where people will be able to apply for their certificates online informing them when their documents would be ready without them having to make trips to the office often,” says Furtado.
Review Bureau
