What's in a title you might ask. What's so special about it? Nothing as far as I know till a few days back. A sequence of events shuddered me. Those events involved a title which I have got the legal rights to use. Before proceeding further, I would like my overseas friends to know the way titles are used by some Indians.

Quite a number of the thousands of Indian titles are based on the city where the title holder resides. So if that person was from Mumbai, he might as well use the title Mumbaikar (of Mumbai). It might get too confusing if I went in depth into this stuff, so let me quickly jot down another example which has relevance to the horrendous sequence of events. Some people use the name of their religion as the title too. Even though I use the title Sett, I am a Jain by religion. Hence it is perfectly legal if I call myself as Sanjay Jain. My cousin, Ms. Reshma Kothari can also call herself Reshma Jain. Quite a few people of the Jain community use the title of the same name. Herein lies the root of the story.

A few days back one of my friends had been refused a broadband connection by the knowledgeable staff of BSNL, the leading ISP of India (the other important ones being Tata Indicom, Reliance and Airtel along with some minor players like Satyam). She had applied for a internet broadband connection along with the security deposit nearly 2 months ago. About 2 weeks ago the enlightened officers of BSNL refused her a connection.

My friend lives in a huge complex where there are many more people who follow the religion of Jainism. According to the officers of BSNL, 2 of my friend's relatives had not paid their dues, hence she was not entitled to the broadband connection. A quick survey revealed that these two people in question were also Jains but not even remotely related to my friend. In fact the complex has more than 80 Jain families and the total number of members is more than 500. Following the principles of BSNL, none of them can avail of an internet connection, just because 2 Jains had defaulted in their payment.

In the meantime my friend has opted for an Airtel connection and has got the same. Their officers are not so knowledgeable. What amazes me is the lack of knowledge of BSNL's officers. Just another opinion... outside the state of West Bengal, all her residents who can speak fluently in the native language are known as Bengalis. I shudder to think what would happen if 2 Bengalis did not pay the bills of BSNL. Would the enlightened staff of BSNL cut off the entire state of West Bengal from accessing the internet via their service?

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sanjay_Sett

Sanjay Sett - EzineArticles Expert Author