Bye bye Hyderabad...

This is my last weekend of my 2-year stay here at Hyderabad.. I'm leaving this city for Bangalore on monday night.. It has been an enriching experience here .. So, dedicating this post for the good old mystical city of Nizams...

Increasingly cosmopolitan, good people to interact, reasonable cost of living , a blend of history and modernity ranging from the good-old forts of Golconda to the ultra hip-hop pubs, Hyderabad has everything.. More than eighty percent of the people know Hindi..So, not much problem on the language front..

If any of you are visiting Hyderabad, Dont miss these places...

1) Golconda Fort

-- Easily the most captivating place that I've been here in Hyd.. The ruins of the fort has a great charm. The sound & light show at night in which the history of the fort is narrated by Amitabh Bachchan is really a lifetime experience...





One photograph from our visit ( a bit old though )







2) Eat street

-- I haven't ever come accross a better place to hang around with friends..This place with lot of restaurants has a great atmosphere..It is just by the side of Hussain Sagar offering you a calm breeze and an awesome sight...

I don't have any photographs of this place with me now...Will putup one soon..


3) Ramoji film city

-- The quintessential Hyderabadi tourist spot.. A wonderland with excellent settings for movies.. Lot of movies including Sarfarosh, Udayanaanu thaaram ( Malayalam ) and many more are shot there... It takes one full day at the bare minimum to visit this place..










And , no visit to Hyderabad is complete without going to the famous Charminar.. Nothing extra-ordinary , other than the historical significance.

( With my parents and brothers @Charminar )

.. A very crowded place..Dont go there in your vehicles..Take a bus and go..Or hire a taxi.
There are other good places like Durgam Cheruvu ( the secret lake --- basically a place meant for couples ..and also singles like us for bird-watching :) ) , Salar-jung museum ( A statue called 'Veiled Rebecca ' -- one of the best architectural beauties that you can see ) , Runway-9 ( go-karting place ) etc.. etc..

Now letme see what Bangalore has in store for me..

Ajith

Bribes..Bribes..Bribes..

For the last few days, I've been extremely busy...A sudden increase in the workload with all those transfer pending matters, it was a bit hectic. This week also marked the first time when I gave bribe to a policeman :((

Till now, I've never had come across such a situation..But this guy proved to be a tough nut to crack..

For all people who are thinking of transferring the vehicles from one state to another , please don't run behind this procedure unless u know someone in police ..Its better to sell it off before you move.. The procedure to get NOC (No objection Certificate ) for transferring your bike from Hyderabad to another state is ..


1) Make sure that RC card has 'self-owned' ..i.e, if you have taken loan for buying car/bike, either close it or get a no-objection certificate from bank and change the owner to yourself rather than 'Hypothecated to ICICI bank' -- This costed me 700

2) Go to Police Control room, and you have to get a traffic police clearance certificate -- 120/- ( don't know what part of this was bribe and what was fees..but found that to be OK.. )

3) Commissioner's office -- Take xerox of RC,license,pollution certificate and write a request..They'll issue two papers - a) User-charge control b) telephone message -- Dont ask me what are these.. 100/- -no bribes here..

4) Go to local police station ( Madapur , near hitec city ) and ask them to do a verification....Here's where the trouble comes..

I went, filled all the forms and requested for verification.

A policeman, he seemed courteous enough helped me through this..In between he mentioned 'Kharcha lagega iske liye'... I said OK, expecting it to be minimal..After everything was done..he started talking about the rates..

Policeman ( PM ) : Minimum paanch sau to dena hai..
Me : (( Wtf ?? )) Sir, passport verification ko bhi sirf teen sau hote hai..
PM : Aisa kuch nahi hain..Paanch sau se kam nahin honge..
Me : Sir please...teen sau pe adjust karo..
PM : Nahi Ajith..Nahi Chalega..
............................................
.............................................
This went on for a while..

By then, i knew it was a waste of time..

Multiple options came to me 1) Make a big noice and alert the inspector..But what if he too turned out to be of this type ?..
2) Leave all at that point, sell of the vehicle at Hyd and move off..
3) Pay it ....

Ultimately I paid..as I love my bike..not because its great, but its very comfortable to ride and I dont want to part with it quickly...

All said and done, the process is not complete yet..Got to go back to the commissioner's office and get to the next stage..After that, got to RTO.. I hope I dont have to come back to this Madhapur police station..

Running cost -- 1420/- + petrol + my valuable time ...

I hope I get it sorted out tomorrow :((

===========================
Update:
===========================
Finally , I got the NOC for bike..
last place was RTO office, which I did through an agent..

Expense in the last lap of the process : 730 /- ..I dont know which part
is a bribe ,which is the actual fee / how much went to the agent..Was too tired by this
stage to fret about that..

Total expense : 2150/- plus the cost of xerox of lot of papers plus petrol plus my time...


Ajith

Hyd == > B'lore.

Two updates..

1) Upgraded to blogger beta..No Issues till now. Very much satisfied with the 'label' feature for the blogs..I dug up almost all the posts and assigned labels. For my best posts, click on the label 'My take' The editing of templates is remarkably better.


2) As the title indicates, I got a transfer ( rather..managed to eke out ) to B'lore..So, will be moving to the Garden city of India from the city of Nizams by this month end.. And yeah,lemme see if any response comes via this route..My office will be at Prestige Blue Chip, opposite to Christ college..So, if anyone in that area is looking for a well behaved, well mannered, etc etc roomie ( I know, a bit exaggerated....but, chalega ) in a 5 - 6 Km radius of that area ..( Koramangala, Madiwala, BTM etc ) , please let me know... :)


Ajith