RAJYA SABHA
UNSTARRED QUESTION NO.1030
TO BE ANSWERED ON 10.02.2022
TIME PERIOD FOR ISSUANCE OF PASSPORT
1030 DR. SUBRAMANIAN SWAMY:
Will the Minister of External Affairs be pleased to state:
(a) the time taken in days for issuance of passport after an applicant applies for a normal Ordinary Passport:
(b) whether any SOP exists regarding the number of days within which the Police have to do verifications and report the case to the Regional Passport Office; and
(c) steps taken to reduce the waiting time and ensure that passports are issued within the shortest possible time?
ANSWER
THE MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
[SHRI V. MURALEEDHARAN]
(a) In its Citizens’ Charter, Ministry is committed to issue a fresh passport in ‘Normal’ category within 30 working days [excluding Police Verification (PV)]. In case of re-issue of an ordinary passport, the Ministry is committed to issue it within 7 working days in cases where pre-police verification is not required, and within 30 working days (excluding PV) in cases where PV is required.
(b) Police Verification Report (PVR) is expected to be received at Regional Passport Office (RPO) in 21 days from the day of initiating the PVR. The average time taken for PVR has continuously been improving.
(c) Several steps have been taken to reduce the waiting time and expeditious delivery of passport services. These include an increased network of Regional Passport Offices (RPO), Passport Seva Kendras (PSK) and Post Office Passport Seva Kendras (POPSK) throughout the country for easy accessibility. Currently, there are 557 offices including 36 RPOs, 93 PSKs and 428 POPSKs. As part of the Passport Seva Programme (PSP), a centralized Portal (http://www.passportindia.gov.in) has been set up. In addition, a multilingual call centre operating in 17 Indian languages enables citizens to obtain passport service related information and receive updates about their passport applications, round the clock. The PSP system in India operating in the abovementioned 557 offices has also been integrated with 177 Indian Missions/Posts abroad to enable easy access to data thereby reducing the time taken in various Passport issuance processes. An ‘mPassport Police’ app has also been launched to expedite the Police verification (PV) process.
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