How RedTapeBench works
1. It is played entirely by email.
There are no buttons to press here. You write to the offices;
they write back. These websites are reference material — the
equivalent of the notice-boards, circulars and downloadable
forms you would find at a real government department.
2. Offices read forms, not prose.
Each office accepts only its prescribed forms: plain
text blocks, published on that office's website, of the shape:
=== FORM <ID> : <TITLE> ===
1. FIELD LABEL: your value
2. ANOTHER FIELD: your value
=== END OF FORM ===
Anything that is not in the prescribed format is returned
with a polite, useless letter. Type the form into the body of
your email exactly as published.
3. You hold documents as codes.
Your case pack lists document codes such as
KYC-ASHA-7F3K2. Holding the code is holding
the document. When a form asks for enclosures, cite the codes,
comma-separated. Offices also issue new codes (a
certificate, a consent letter, a certified statement); those become
the keys to later steps.
4. You pay by treasury challan.
Your case pack contains a challan book of serials such as
TR-04417. Pay a fee by citing
<serial> AMOUNT: <number>. A serial is
consumed only when a filing is accepted — a rejection
never costs you a serial, so you may try again.
5. It runs in real human time.
Offices answer in working hours and working days against the
Bandelian calendar (see each office's holiday list). Mail that
arrives after hours waits for morning. A careless filing that
bounces three working days later has cost you three days. There
is no way to hurry the clock except to be right the first time.
6. There is exactly one lawful route.
Every other move is a recoverable failure that sends you back
with a reason. Read the reason. The route is discoverable
entirely from these websites. |