Praise needs to be given where it is due. With this, I opened my experience at Motorway Licensing Office, Sector H8, Islamabad. Everything was unusually ordered, planned and up to date. They literally are serving the people!
I don’t know who enforced this but the office of the Motorway Licensing Authority at H8 is like … the ideal government office that there can be. I had to make a motorcycle license. Initially, with Google, I knew that a learning permit would be due instead of an official driving license. On a Bykea, I arrived at the office around 10 am. Outside the building, there’s a cooler with cool water. Inside, the process was super smooth. You go to the reception where two lady police soldiers (or officers, I don’t know what the pips on their uniforms mean) see your documents. Then they guide you to the relevant room. It is clean and cold. For a new learner’s permit, you go to the “last room on the right side” which then is further divided into three cubicles. Here inside one of the cubicles, I had the one and only (minor) issue that I viewed as a ‘problem’ for the general public. I’ll explain in detail later.
I went to that first cubicle where they enter your data into their computer system. With me, I had only a COVID vaccination certificate, the original CNIC and a photocopy of the same and my University card. It was a long line as I arrived at 10 am. By 10:40 am, I was in front of the line. The guy took my papers and verified/entered the data into his computer. Then he told me to go to the central reception (different from the main reception) and get a token. 100th was my token number. So, I sat there waiting for my 100th number to be called. I played a little 8 ball pool and then called my mom in one of the rare “no-agenda talks”. At 12 pm, a flashing ‘100’ neon sign bearing on the centre wall at the top of the central cubicle called me in. The kind lady sitting there asked me for my medical report. I said I don’t have any. She asked me to bring one. I asked the reason. She said, “To check your blood group”. I slid my university card a little towards her and said, “Ma’am, this is a University card saying my Blood group is B+”. She began checking the expiry date. I blurted out, “Ma’am, the blood group stays the same even after expiry :)”. Unlike my expectation at this point (that was of being thrown out of the cubicle), she just wrote “B+” on the photocopy of my CNIC. I took a sigh of relief. I had passed the 2nd cubicle.
For a brief moment, I had to go back to cubicle one to get my picture taken for the license. That was a disaster. Then I moved on to the third cubicle. I did not have to wait there at all. It was an eye test, and I had my glasses on so it was easy. There he told me to go to the main reception again and give them my CNIC. I did so. The main receptionist gave me a book to read for the learner’s permit MCQMCQ test. It was a 350 MCQs testbook. It was 01 pm. With a presentation due at 01: 30 pm, I asked the guy if it was possible to pause my proceedings for now and come back for the test later. He said, “Yes”. I took my CNIC and returned to the University.
After a day, I went there again, this time at 8 am. I gave the same guy my CNIC and got the Urdu learner’s test book. The waiting hall saw me reading each one of those 350 MCQs for an hour and a half. I was afraid if I fail this test, I would be barred from driving my motorcycle. At 09:30 am, I went in for the test. It’s four machines in four cubicles in a large room, with a Motorway Police Person supervising the applicants. I started the test. It was 20 questions with a margin of 3 wrong questions allowed. Ap k bhai ne 350MCQs pdhe ve the. Aced it! 20/20 and genuinely felt as happy as I did in Class 1 when I appeared first in class, the one and only time in my academic career. I got my learner’s license and whooshed back to university.
Some separate incidents happened which really made me admire the administration and staff. While I was arguing in cubicle two for my Blood Group’s expiry date, a visibly poor, skinny, practical Muslim in his 30s came in. In front of the lady, he was looking at his feet and nowhere else. The lady paused my work and catered to his need first which I really liked. What I expected and what happens in most government offices is that any intruder is shouted “BHAI JAN AP BAHIR APNI BARI KA INTZAR KREN!!!”. There was not a speck of “I-have-the-power-to-make-or-break-your-license” in that lady that day. I loved the system in place.
Secondly on Saturday when I went for the test at 8 am, the offices were opening. Everything was functional by 8:10 am on a Saturday. And I myself saw some senior guys with stars and pips on their uniform coming up to receptions and in the doors of different offices, actually wishing people “Slam”. They were treating their employees just like any other human being. I have seen rich civilians treating their servant boys and girls much worse. Admirable was this for a socialist student critic of the government. Who set this office, I really want to know? Although I here would like to mention that as a staunch believer in the socialist system, all the credit of the H8 Motorway office working smoothly does not go to these few powerful, polite individuals. I would say that they must be serving as an inspiration for the staff to keep the system in place working flawlessly.
Lastly, the minor small problem that I faced in cubicle one was the longgggg line there. This is because the guy stationed there to verify and enter each person’s data in the system is also the in-charge of taking pictures of people coming out from cubicle two (the lady’s cubicle). This makes him doubly busy. While at cubicle three, the eye test guy stays free most of the time as he has a relatively easy job. I think the top-notch Canon EOS fixed in the first cubicle would be more efficient for use in the third cubicle. I hope somehow, this blog reaches those inspirational officers who are in charge.
This is how I got my first license. Happy browsing
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