I’m Alive

Illustration by Copilot Designer

How do you prove to anyone that you’re alive? Go and stand in front of the person and declare, “I’m Tom, Shyam or Hari”? No, that won’t work in India. Let me share my personal experience. It’s as absurd as the plight of Kafka’s protagonist in The Castle. A land surveyor is summoned for duty, only to be told that the mere fact a land surveyor was summoned does not prove he is that land surveyor though he has the appointment letter with him.

I received a mail from the Life Insurance Corporation of India [LIC] that I should prove my existence in order to continue receiving my annuity on the sum I had invested with them five years ago. They’re only paying the interest on the sum I have given them. They’re not doing me any charity. Yet they want me to prove to them that I am still alive in order to continue getting the annual amount they are obligated to pay me.

This is India. LIC is a government undertaking. If I don’t follow their injunction, I will certainly lose my money. So I take a printout of the “Life Certificate” they sent me and go to the nearest government school in order to get it attested by the headmaster, as required by LIC. The headmaster (or any such person whom LIC has listed) has to certify that “he is fully satisfied about (my) identity.”

This HM refused to sign. “I don’t know you,” he said. I said I had countless government-issued identity cards with me: Aadhar, PAN, Passport, Driving License, Ration Card, EPIC… “That won’t be enough,” the HM insisted. “Either I should know you personally or someone who knows me here should also know you.”

I said, “You can just Google my name and you’ll see hundreds of my pictures along with my write-ups in various places.”

He smirked. “That won’t do.”

He picked up his phone and called the President of the Parent Teacher Association [PTA]. That man didn’t know me, but he knew my brother. Mercifully, that was enough. The HM signed the Certificate which stated that he was fully satisfied about my identity.  

My physical existence along with the countless identity cards issued by my governments (central and state) were all worthless. One phone call to a man who had never seen or known me in any way satisfied the HM! Of course, he didn’t forget to write in the top corner of my certificate that my identity was confirmed by the President of the PTA.

The HM of a school that stood less than a kilometre from my home didn’t trust me. How do I expect LIC to trust me?

I went to the LIC office with the certificate which stated that the HM of my neighbourhood school was satisfied with my identity and found myself in what looked like a Kafkaesque administrative labyrinth. I approached the first officer there who looked the least hostile and said, “I received a mail from LIC that I need to provide a certificate stating that I hadn’t died yet. Where do I submit this?” I held up my Life Certificate which I hadn’t even folded.

Suddenly there was silence in the office. Too many faces looked up from their tables. “Did I say anything wrong?” I asked the lady whom I had approached with my certificate.

She smiled genially and pointed to a table behind which was written “CLAIMS”, “Submit it there.”

“Up to the age of 70, you have to submit this certificate once in 5 years,” she said.

“After that?” I asked.

“Every year.”

LIC will be happy if I die at 70, it appeared.

By the way, the government of India has been plucking a Life Certificate every year from me right from the time I turned 60. Looks like my government is eager to see me dead too.

“You don’t have to come personally,” the LIC officer consoled me. She sounded genuinely concerned. That was a consolation. “You can get this certificate attested and send it through anyone.” She sounded more humane than my local headmaster. She also suggested that I could do it from home through a new App introduced by LIC. My eyes sparkled. I won’t need any living person to prove to LIC that I am alive; a lifeless tap-toy could do it. Funny.

Related Post: Identity Crisis