Muharram 26, 1448 AH
Allah Allah karke weekend aata hai. Aadha sone mein nikal jata hai, aadha forms bharne mein.
I don’t know if many people know this (other than Indians), us Indians have to prove that we are Indians, and there’s a series of activities going on. Finding the documents of all family members, which means checking every cupboard and office table in the house (because we never find things where we last kept them, okay? that’s some kind of law in our house), filling the forms, making sure they are mapped together with dad’s voter ID… It was a lot of work. It didn’t help that the forms were in Marathi, not our first (English), second (Hindi), or third (Urdu) choice.
The first round of collecting all photos and document was done yesterday evening. I also files income tax return yesterday, which in itself was a huge deal. Last time, I tried to do it on the last day, the website was very slow, and… let’s not talk about it, the anxiety resurfaces even if I try to tell that story.
The form-filling activity was planned for today. We started around 2 PM, right after Zuhr, and… before I knew, it was 4 o’clock. Most of the forms were done, I took a short lunch break, leaving things to my brother; he skipped lunch. Then, he drove to the panchayat office (our locality comes under panchayat, not tehsil or corporation) for submitting the forms. He called once to confirm something, came half-an hour later. I asked him for updates, as I do, and concluded that he made a boo-boo for mum’s form and mapped it someone else, and not dad’s voter ID. Off he went again. This time, returning much later. But, all is done, or so he claims.
Now, we wait for the third round of activity where officers will come house-to-house and confirm the same details again. Allah woh marhala bhi aasaan kare, ameen.
My nephews and nieces also visited us later in the evening, and then the house turned into a stadium, itni awaz, itna shor, uff Allah. Dinner, some more shor tamasha and finally they all left around 11 PM. Sunday ki raunaq lagti hi nahin if the kids don’t visit. Ab agle hafte.
NOTE: This is part of “write one post every day for a year” challenge.
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Shabana Mukhtar