After obtaining my Portuguese Passport in May last year and after duly surrendering my Indian Passport as required by law by following all procedures to the letter, I thought that obtaining an OCI card would have been a formality, an automatic corollary.
But to my utter dismay it has not been so. It has been a long gruelling struggle without any logical reason to obtain that OCI Card which is my entitlement as per law. Despite my age now, that inborn fighting spirit for what is right has not dampened.
All I can now hope is that the Union Home Ministry (MHA) will without fear or favour act in a very fair and just manner to this little man who has had the best interests of Goa at Heart by being very vocal and outspoken for the common good, but now possibly having to pay a very high price.
Though an OCI Card is not the end of the world, I will pursue my undeniable right to the very end to ensure that I have not lost my right for no reason at all. Obtaining an OCI when I have acted in good faith and followed all the regulations and procedures should be a formality and not a pointless battle.
They say that patience is a virtue but with the passing of time one tends to lose patience especially when an injustice is so blatantly being carried out by an inexplicable delay, but fortunately the limits of my patience are growing otherwise.
Hope common sense and the law of natural justice that ensures fairness and reasonableness, equality and equity in decision making processes will prevail and the Ministry of Home Affairs will process my application without any further delay remembering the famous words of the late Martin Luther King Jr ‘A right delayed is a right denied’.
