Master Adnan Raja with his family and Dr. R. Sivakumar, RPO, Kolkata.
New Delhi, June22, 2013: Passport Seva Project (PSP), the mission mode programme of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), which runs in Public-Private-Partnership mode with Tata Consultancy Services as a service provider completed its first year of successful rollout last week. The project which was launched with an objective to deliver passport services to citizens of India in a timely, transparent, more accessible and reliable manner, has achieved a landmark figure of processing more than one crore passport applications since its inception in 2010.
A six year old boy from Kolkata, Master Adnan Raja became the lucky passport applicant, whose application was processed as the 1,00,00,000th application in the Passport Seva System.
Muktesh Pardeshi, Joint Secretary, Passport Seva Project and Chief Passport Officer said, “Processing more than one crore applications for passports and related services is a noteworthy milestone. Our officials have been working relentlessly to provide hassle-free passport services to the fellow citizens. We have also taken assertive steps to streamline and simplify the process for passport applicants.”
As part of MEA’s e-Governance initiatives, the Passport Seva Project has transformed the passport issuance system across India. The Ministry is improving governance in Passport Offices by focusing on citizen-centricity, service orientation and transparency.
Other benefits of the Passport Seva Project include:
• Longer working hours to benefit the citizens.
• 24*7 Call Center Support in 17 languages
• Complete digitization and processing of application when applicant visits the PSK, reducing the overall time spent and eliminating multiple visits
• Biometric data and photographs taken in highly secure environment
• Granting decision taken in front of the applicant, therefore greater transparency
• Citizens leave the PSK with certainty on the status of their application
• Transparency in the process and online real-time availability of data for ease of monitoring and decision making
• Availability of mobile application mPassportSeva for information and status tracking of a passport application
• Newly introduced online payment based appointments to curb the problem of absenteeism and curb the role of touts