US$250 million passport project launched in India

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Central Government

By Amelia Kwok | 30 October 2008

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in India will be rolling out the Passport Seva Project (PSP), the largest mission-critical e-governance project valued at over US$205 million.

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The PSP would digitise the entire passport services lifestyle and allow online filing of applications. Applicants also have the alternative option of filling up the Intelligent Character Recognition (ICR)-enabled form which along with all relevant documents, will be scanned and submitted at Passport Facilitation Centres (PFC).

The PFC will function as the primary hub that will support all activities like biometric capture, photograph, payment and verification and grant of passports in the presence of applicants for most cases. A call centre will also be established to provide applicants with the necessary information pertaining to passport procedures and the status of submitted requests. Also, grievances of citizens can be tracked through the system.

The project will help speed up the process of issuing passports to citizens. Currently, it takes about 45 days from the date verification of information for issuance of a new passport under normal procedure and about 14 days under the Tatkal procedure.

The ministry aims to reduce the waiting time for a new passport to three working days while passports issued under the Tatkal scheme should be dispatched on the same day, subject to address and police verification of applicants.

The nationwide roll-out of PSP will take place within six years and the government will also establish 77 Passport Filing centres across the country.

According to Shivshankar Menon, Foreign Secretary at the MEA, “The Passport Seva Project, based on a public-private partnership model, aims to provide passport-related services to Indian citizens in a speedy, convenient and transparent manner. The sovereign and fiduciary function of granting and issuing passport remains with MEA while Tata Consultancy Services will be our technology and operations partner for this project.”

This will enable citizens to enjoy the benefits of a technology-led, service oriented approach to passports while ensuring that proper security, safety and safeguards are maintained.

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