Congress decries poor facilities at Passport Seva Kendra

 

Youth Congress members and supporters protest in front of Passport Seva Kendra in Mangalore on 

 

The activists led by Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee Secretary Ivan D’Souza raised slogans against the Tata Consultancy Services for not providing basic facilities for people coming to submit documents at the Kendra.

Several Congress activists on Tuesday staged a demonstration demanding better facilities at the Passport Seva Kendra. The activists had carried out a similar agitation in June 2010.

The activists led by Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee Secretary Ivan D’Souza raised slogans against the Tata Consultancy Services for not providing basic facilities for people coming to submit documents at the Kendra. “They are spoiling the name of the Centre. We do not want your service here,” Mr. D’Souza said.

The demonstrations were held outside the Kendra at 11 a.m. The activists tried to enter the Kendra, but were prevented by police, who had come in large numbers. Two Passport Generating Officers of the Regional Passport Office came out of the Kendra to hear the grievances submitted in the form of a memorandum. Officials of the TCS also accompanied the passport officers.

Addressing the passport officers, Mr. D’Souza said the seating arrangements in the Kendra were inadequate to accommodate over 500 people who visit the Kendra every day. He said the four toilets at the Kendra were in a bad condition. Mr. D’Souza said no railing have been put to prevent passport applicants from stepping onto the busy road adjoining the Kendra. “We are here not because our applications have been rejected. We are here to highlight the problems of the people. We want this to be relocated to the office of Deputy Commissioner or on the Zilla Panchayat premises,” he said.

The passport officers received the memorandum and promised action on the aspects pointed out by the Congress activists.

The TCS personnel asked a few of the Congress activists to come into the Kendra and look at the facilities, which the latter refused. The TCS personnel at the Kendra declined to comment on the points raised by the protesters.

                                                                                              Courtesy : The Hindu

Ministry plans to open more Passport Seva Kendras

“Procedure for issuing passport can’t be simplified further”

E. Ahamed

In order to process the increasing number of passport applications and cater to other services required by existing passport holders, the Union Ministry is working on opening more Passport Seva Kendras (PSKs) across the country, said E. Ahamed, Union Minister of State for External Affairs and Human Resource Development on Thursday.

Talking to reporters, Mr. Ahamed said that in order to make sure that services relating to passports were easily availably and that too closer to citizens, the Ministry went in for PSKs and as many as 77 were opened in the first phase. Now, based on the representations and requests received for passport offices in various places, the Ministry had commenced the preliminary work.

The choice of place for opening PSKs would depend on the population density, potential passport seekers and on the number of people holding passports in the area, who would require other miscellaneous services.

Asked about closure of District Passport Cells wherever PSKs had become operational, Mr. Ahamed said that the Ministry was ensuring the availability of passport-related services first before closing the DPCs. He said that the objective of providing applications and related services online was basically aimed making things easy for the people.

To a query on simplification of procedures for obtaining passports, Mr. Ahamed pointed out that issue of passport required careful scrutiny and verification as it involved internal security. The procedures cannot be further simplified. He added that only for reasons of security, the Ministry chose not to do away with police verification, which continued to be a pre-requisite for issuing a passport.

Asked whether the Ministry accepts Aadhaar ID cards i.e., UIDs and Identity Cards issued by Postal Department, as a valid address proof document along with an application for issue of passports, Mr. Ahamed said it would be considered.

On Pranab Mukherjee as the Presidential candidate of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), Mr. Ahmed said that the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), a constituent of the UPA, had announced that it would support the candidate chosen by the UPA leader Sonia Gandhi.

Courtesy : The Hindu

Passport office to work on Saturday, Sunday to clear backlog

Beginning this Saturday, many Passport Seva Kendras will remain open even on weekends, the ministry of external affairs has said.

NEW DELHI: The TOI campaign on the passport logjam has made the government put reforms on the fast track. In an unprecedented move, the ministry of external affairs on Thursday announced a 'Passport Mela' this weekend at many PSKs countrywide - the kendras will remain open on Saturday and Sunday and people can just walk in, without an appointment. This practice will continue till the entire backlog has been cleared.

In a special briefing to TOI, Raghavendra Shastry, adviser to external affairs minister S M Krishna, gave details of fresh measures that are expected to address the concerns raised by the people - and reported by this newspaper to help make the new passport application process smoother and transparent.

The ministry has also reviewed the online appointment process, and from Friday, an additional 30% slots are being released. This will take the number of daily slots in the capital from 1,650 to 2,050. Moreover, appointments will now be given for up to 30 days instead of 15. "This way, we believe we will be able to process 6 lakh applications in the country this year," said chief passport officer and joint secretary in MEA Muktesh Kumar Pardeshi.

"We have taken the suggestions given by TOI seriously and want people to know that we are working hard on them. There has been a huge backlog of applications due to the holiday rush, which is why we are having this passport mela. MEA is doing it for the first time in the country. This will help us smoothen the service in about six weeks from now," said Shastry.

"We will entertain walk-ins only on weekends. And people need not form queues early in the morning. They can come anytime after 10am," said Basant K Gupta, additional secretary, consular passport & visa division, MEA.

The ministry has reiterated its promise of revisiting its website. "There has been a lot of confusion over the passport application website. The older site, www.passport.gov.in is no longer functional but people have been visiting it. Therefore, we are going to redirect traffic from there to our functional portal, www.passportindia.gov.in. We are also going to prepare a fresh list of documents required for applying under various categories. There will be no ambiguity in %the process anymore," Gupta said.

Does this mean that there will be no more surprise demands for additional documents by PSKs? "Yes. TCS staff will no longer decide what documents are needed. Now, only government officials will check if all documents are in place and if anything else is required," said Gupta.

So far, the applicants who were turned back by PSKs for lack of documents had to try their luck again with %the online appointment system to book a slot. "This will not happen anymore. If there is any requirement of a document, an
applicant will be given three days to return with the papers," Pardeshi said.

To ensure prompt delivery of passports, the postal department has been roped in. "The postman will be given an incentive of Rs 50 per delivery. He will call up or send an SMS before coming to ensure that the passport is delivered to the person to whom it is issued," said Raghavendra Shastry, advisor to minister of external affairs.

He said that the system will be implemented across the country and S M Krishna will personally write to all state chief ministers to ensure implementation of the revised rules.

Apart from Delhi, passport melas will be held at the following places: RPO, Koramangla, and PSKs at Sai Arcade, Lalbagh, Mangalore and Hubli in Bangalore; RPO and PSKs at Nelson Manickam Road, Saligramam, and Tambaram in Chennai; RPO and PSKs at Begumpet, Ameerpet, Toli Chowki, Vijayawada, Tirupati and Nizamabad in Hyderabad; RPO and PSKs in Lucknow, Kanpur, Varanasi, and Gorakhpur; and passport office at 14 Mall Road in Amristar.

 

Courtesy : Times of India

 

Passport Seva Kendra opened at Tripunithura

The Passport Seva Kendra that was inaugurated at Tripunithura on Wednesday. 

Of the 13 Passport Seva Kendras (PSK) allocated to the State as part of the Ministry of External Affairs' ‘Passport Seva Project' aimed at providing efficient and speedy service to passport applicants, 10 have begun operations on a trial basis. They are gearing up to dole out full-scale services in a month's time.

While the PSKs at Thiruvananthapuram, Neyyattinkara and Kollam under Regional Passport Office (RPO), Thiruvananthapuram; Tripunithura, Aluva, Alappuzha and Kottayam under RPO, Ernakulam; Malappuram under RPO, Malappuram; and Kozhikode and Vadakara under RPO, Kozhikode have become functional, PSKs at Thrissur, Kannur and Payyannur are expected to begin service by mid-March.

“With the PSKs launching the service, none of the speed post centres and the District Passport Collection Centres at Aluva, Kottayam and Alappuzha will accept applications from tomorrow [March 1]. After submitting applications online at our centralised website www.passportindia.gov.in applicants can now walk into the PSK of their choice on the appointed date with relevant documents to complete the process in less than an hour,” B. Sreekumar, Regional Passport Officer, Ernakulam, told the media at the newly-opened Tripunithura PSK.

However, till the Thrissur PSK came into being, the existing passport cell there would continue to receive applications, he said.

Once fully operational, each PSK, Mr. Sreekumar said, would process 500 applications a day and the time taken for delivery of ordinary and Tatkal passports would come down drastically, eventually to not more than three days subject to police clearance.

The impressive, public-friendly PSKs, readied by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), which is executing the Passport Seva Project, have their front-end office, manned by TCS staff, where collection of biometric data takes place while passport officials verify documents and collect fees.

== COURTESY   THE HINDU  KOCHI, March 1, 2012

Chief Passport Officer to launch operations at Tiruchi, Thanjavur PSK

People at the Passport Seva Kendra branch on Sasthri Road in Tiruchi on Monday.

Joint Secretary and Chief Passport Officer, Ministry of External Affairs, Muktesh Kumar Pardeshi, will launch operations at the new Passport Seva Kendras (PSK) in Tiruchi and Thanjavur on June 29.

The Tiruchi PSK equipped to service 250 to 300 applicants every day will serve Tiruchi, Karur and Perambalur districts while the one at Thanjavur with a capacity to handle 300 to 350 applicants a day will cater to applicants in Thanjavur, Nagapattinam, Thiruvarur, Pudukkottai and Ariyalur districts, K. Balamurugan, Regional Passport Officer, told presspersons on Monday.

The two PSKs, each headed by an Assistant Passport Officer, will function under the jurisdiction of Regional Passport Office, Tiruchi. Tata Consultancy Services would handle front-end services that would include receiving and streamlining applications, photographing and collecting biometric data of applicants at the Kendras. The PSKs will eliminate the problem of touts, Mr. Balamurugan said, adding that the role of travel agents will be confined to rendering service for filling in applications.

The Regional Passport Office will have one counter to handle limited number of applications of all types in emergency situations. Likewise, the District Passport Cells, where applications for fresh passports alone will be received, will continue to function until the PSKs are able to take the load. The duration of police verification could be reduced by seven to ten days under the new online procedure approved by the Director General of Police for the offices of Superintendents of Police to convey acceptance or refusal.

Only applications with prior appointment will be processed at PSK, and the applicants after obtaining the Application Reference Number can choose their time to get the formalities fulfilled by producing all original documents and photocopies as required till 4.00 p.m. Status of applications under the new system could be tracked by calling the call centre at 1800-258-1800 or by logging on to www.passportindia.gov.in, Mr. Balamurugan said.

The two PSKs under the jurisdiction of Regional Passport Office, Tiruchi, are among 77 PSKs planned across the country as a mission mode program under the National e-governance plan. Seven PSKs – two in Bangalore, and one each in Mangalore, Hubli, Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Ambala – are already open to citizens, processing 3,500 applications on a daily basis. So far, 5.6 lakh applications have been processed through the Passport Seva Project (PSP) scheme.

== COURTESY   THE HINDU  MADURAI, June 27, 2011

Madurai Passport seva kendra to function from June 30

  

HI-TECH: The finger prints of a passport applicant being scanned by a TCS executive at the Passport Seva Kendra in Madurai on Monday.

The Passport Seva Kendra, which would function in collaboration with the Tata consultancy services, will start functioning in this city from June 30, according to a senior official.

The kendra was being established as per the Memorandum of Understanding between the External Affairs Ministry and the TCS. While Chennai would have three Kendras, Madurai, Tiruchirappalli, Coimbatore and Thanjavur would have one each.

The applications of six districts including Theni, Dindigul, Madurai, Virudhunagar, Ramanathapuram and Sivaganga would be processed at Kochadai in Madurai.

Applicants of Tirunelveli, Kanyakumari and Tuticorin could use one at Tirunelveli, Passport officer (Madurai zone)Jose K.Mathew told reporters last evening.

The applicants can log on to the Kendra website and fill in the application forms online.

A large size screen informed the status of the applications. The TCS authorities would process the papers.

The Process included photographing and fingerprint reading with modern gadgets. Since the Photographs would be taken at the kendra, the applicants need not carry any photographs.

It would not take more than a month from the acceptance of the applications for issuing passport, sources said, adding, the kendra would work from 9:30 to 5PM.

== COURTESY   THE HINDU  MADURAI, June 28, 2011