Getting a Duplicate Driving Licence Issued at RTO Pune – Surprisingly Easy

meeta lost her licence. I also wanted my licence changed – because mine was old and tattered and I wanted the new snazzy smartcard licence.

Today we decided to go to the RTO office in Pune, all by ourselves, without an agent, and get ourselves duplicate licences issues. The process was surprisingly painless.

Unfortunately, the procedure is not really well documented on the web, hence I’m writing it, for the benefit of others:

  • If you’ve lost your licence, you’ll need to file an FIR with the local police station, and bring along a copy of it. If you’re just looking to replace a tattered old licence, just bring that old licence along.
  • First download and print Form LLD from the rtopune website. Fill out this form.
  • Attach two passport size photos to the form with a paperclip.

As far as I can tell, you don’t need any other documents.

Land up at the RTO office. The official timings for this are from 10am to 2:30pm, but when we went, the 3 relevant windows opened at varying times between 10:15 and 10:35. So I suggest you land up at 10:30.

Ignore all the agents who will keep accosting you from the time you enter the gate. They’ll make it seem like it’s impossible to get anything done without an agent – ignore them. Go to Block C. Get the official to check your account in their computers, and sign your form. Then go to Block B, pay fees. If you’re just replacing a lost smartcard with a new one – you’re done. If you’re converting from old-style license to a smartcard, you need to get your biometrics done. After that you’re done.

When we went (at 10am) there were no queues at any of the 3 windows, so we could have been done in less than 10 minutes. However, the Block C person was eating something at her desk so we had to wait a few minutes for her. Then the fees window opened at 10:30. And the biometrics window opened at 10:35. So we were done by 10:45.

If you land up there by 10:30, I think you should be done by 11.

Remember though, parking is a pain there, so might want to go Uber or rickshaw. Except if you’re Sarika (for whom, primarily this article is written, and who owns a building next-door) 🙂

The Yogi and the Daughter-in-Law

Here’s a poem by Bahinabai Chaudhari, who, in spite of being an illiterate housewife (from the Khandesh region of Maharashtra), was an accomplished poet. She verbally composed poems during her lifetime – her son wrote them down and published them after her death.

I’ve attempted a translation of it, and it loses much in translation, but the original is so powerful that some of it still shines through. Here’s I have used Mom’s house for the word maher (which is equivalent to Hindi’s maayka), and in-laws’ for sasar (which is equivalent to the Hindi sasural). These are very poor placeholders. You need to remember what life for a woman was like in the days before urban nuclear families – and all the hardships and humiliations in the big, nasty place that was the husband’s joint-family home. That’s sasar/sasural. And that is in contrast to the loving, caring, carefree place that was the mom’s house – the maher/maayka. Keep that in mind while reading the translation.

If you understand Marathi, skip directly to the Ahirani original below.

The Yogi and the Daughter-in-Law

Yogi:

What’s this disturbance, as I sit here meditating
Woman, stop your mouth from blabbering

‘My Mom’s-house Mom’s-house’ – this song is constantly on your lips
Then why did you come from your mom’s-house to your in-laws’?

Daughter in law:

I have cravings, says the soil of the fields,
Singing songs of Mom’s-house, means I’m pregnant with a girl,

Pay careful attention Yogi, listen to what I say,
For the daughter to have a Mom’s house, the mom toils at the in-laws’,

Where’s God, Where’s God, filled up everywhere and still left over,
And the left overs have all permeated into my Mom’s house.

योगी आणि सासुरवाशीन

I’ve reproduced the original here for you to appreciate if you
understand Marathi. (Technically, it is in Ahirani a language from the
Khandesh region of Maharashtra – but it’s close enough to Marathi that
you should not have trouble understanding it.)

योगी:
बसलो मी देवध्यानी, काय मधी हे संकट
बाई बंद कर तुझ्या तोंडातली वटवट

“माझं माहेर माहेर” सदा गाणं तुझ्या ओठी
मंग माहेरून आली सासरले कशासाठी ?

सासुरवाशीन:
आरे, लागले डोहाये सांगे शेतातली माटी
गाते माहेराचं गानं लेक येईल रे पोटी

देरे देरे योग्या ध्यान एक काय मी सांगते
लेकीच्या माहेरासाठी माय सासरी नांदते

देव कुठे देव कुठे, भरीसनी जो उरला
अरे, उरीसनी माझ्या माहेरात सामावला

लेकीच्या माहेरासाठी माय सासरी नांदते (For the daughter to have a Mom’s house, the mom toils at the in-laws’). What a line!

Should you encourage your child to take a gap year before college?

Should you (would you?) encourage your child to take a “gap year” before starting college (i.e. after 12th)? If no, why not? If yes, how would you suggest the child plan the year? What activities/experiences would you hope for the child to take up? Does your answer change depending upon whether the child is going to do college in India vs the US?

My friend Suvikas Bhandari’s daughter just finished a very successful gap year. And she has written about her experience. In addition, I wanted the opinions of others who have gone through this in the past, or are thinking about it.

So I posted this question on my Facebook page and got a bunch of great responses, some of which I’m reproducing below.

Note: I am NOT talking about taking an year off to “study for the JEE.” The gap year is not about studying and academics. Studying in an Indian college becomes all about just the subjects, and that too, often theory. A gap year is about taking an year off so the child can travel alone, take up one or more jobs/internships, learn some out-of-the-way skills, and generally get life experience. A gap year helps with giving a sense of perspective, a sense of responsibility, and most importantly, an idea of what matters in the real world (which can help a lot in college to make you focus on the right things).

Gap is Good – But should it be well planned or not?

In general, most people felt that a gap year is good – but many qualified the statement by saying something like “gap with proper guidance for a limited time frame would be really productive” or “gap year but should have full plan on hand before u decide on it”.

On the other hand, Rujuta disagrees:

However, I am against having a detailed plan – I would say have a plan but be prepared to throw it out of the window when you think it isn’t working or your experience along the way takes you in a different direction. Plan to be out of your comfort zone…plan to do things you have never done before….don’t preplan what you want to learn….don’t get demotivated if all of the year wasn’t ‘productive’. I wish I had the opportunity to do this.

First Hand Experiences

The best comments I felt were first-hand accounts from my friends who themselves took a gap year (intentionally, or forced due to circumstances) and wrote about that.

For example, Idea Smith shared her own experience:

I don’t know if this is relevant but I’ll share something. I had a gap year of sorts just before I graduated (long story involving science-vs-arts battle with family, low attendance and ATKTs). In that time, I worked out, lived in another city for 3 months, interned with an ad agency, did a life program called the Landmark Forum and found my first boyfriend. Having that year really changed the course of my life because it gave me a chance to think and explore outside the rigid social construct I was in. After I graduated, I actually worked for a year alongside preparing for CAT. I didn’t need a gap year that someone like me normally would have, because I had had it the year earlier.

It also helped me discover that I would always need periodic breaks of that sort to collect my thoughts and refocus my attention. That’s what kept me from getting desperate in 2003, after the recession and when jobs were scarce. It’s also what allowed me to take a sabbatical in 2005 at a time when people were holding on to their jobs. And finally, all these helped me quit my corporate job in 2009 to do other things – knowing that it was okay to stop running, think and even do something else, without always having a 10-step plan and bulletpointed details down.

That was 15 years ago and I know a lot of things have changed. It might be good if the family/parents did not impose a lot of activities on their child. Instead, if possible it might make a lot of sense to encourage the child to think about what interests him/her and then help him/her find activities that let him/her explore it.

And Ankit Saxena had a similar story:

I have my own interesting experience on this one. I was forced to take a gap year in between my engineering because of attendance shortage, which meant I had to lose an year and also a complete 9 months free time without college.I was an electronic engg. student but always wanted to learn computer science (as I was good at it since childhood days) , but you dont necessarily get to choose the college and branch at your will.

So in my “gap” months , I had the best time of my life. I joined a tech startup based out of my college E-cell and learned how to write bigger softwares and not just palindrome programs. We implemented ERP for a Bangalore based company and made a POS solution for the hospitality sector – with Windows Mobile App for stewards in restaurant to take orders and implemented the system in a couple of big restaurants in Mumbai.

I learned about softwares, startups, business, execution and everything about sustaining chaos. Six months later I was leading software development for the company with a team of 6 engineers. All before I turned 20.

PS: I went back to studies after 9 months and topped my branch that semester and did my own startup from the same E-cell a year later.

So in hindsight, according to me, its always good to take a break from the social norm stream and explore what you like.

In Depth Reading on this topic

Manish Kumar suggests a couple of books that you could read, about Indian kids who took a gap year and wrote about it:

I have taken such break myself and I recently wrote about my experience here in a note. I also know many people who have taken “gap year” for various reasons…

If you’re curious, I would highly recommend 2 books by Indian kids who have taken “gap year” long ago.

(1) Free From School by Rahul Alvares.
(2) Learning the Heart Way by Samyukta

The printed copies are not available for these books, but I guess Gutenberg project has soft copies. Both are highly recommended for older children – maybe 8th standard & up!

(Manish also points out that Marathi hardcopies of these books are available from BookGanga.com)

Avinash Punekar pointed out one possible downside of a gap year:

BTW, most Indian companies tend to reject candidates with education/career gap automatically.

Note, however, that some companies do it, not all or even many. Also, if a company has a stupid policy like this, I am not entirely sure of whether you should be joining this company.

There are many other interesting comments which I’m not reproducing in the interest of keeping this short, but please check out the original discussion.