Andhra Pradesh - Tirupati   

Regional Passport office reaches out to people

Staff Reporter

SpeedPost centres to collect applications

B. Bala Bhaskar

TIRUPATI: Passport applications will soon be collected in as many SpeedPost centres in the State. At present, the applications are sold at the post offices and as per the recent directive of the External Affairs Ministry, the Regional Office has identified 100 SpeedPost centres in the State to collect the applications to reach out to a larger clientele. The postal staff has also been trained to don this new role and there are plans to open more such centres.

"With a view to bringing as many citizens into our fold, we have taken up several novel measures, including going to villages and semi-urban places, both to create awareness among the public on the importance of possessing a passport and also to collect the application forms," the Regional Passport Officer, Hyderabad, B.Bala Bhaskar said.

Camp office opened

Mr.Bhaskar inaugurated the camp office at the Passport application collection centre (PACC) in Annamayya circle here on Saturday.

Addressing a media conference later, he said that the Tirupati PACC collected a whopping 31,802 applications and generated a revenue of Rs.3.19 crores last year, standing first among the five collection centres in the country, in terms of collection.

Listing the citizen-friendly steps, Mr.Bhaskar mentioned the simplification of Emigration Check Not Required (ECNR) process, decentralisation of application submission and introduction of token system to streamline processing. The list of officials who could issue verification certificates had been widened to include Mandal Revenue Officers and Police Station House Officers (SHO) also.

For further penetration, the concept of `3 out of 14' had been introduced wherein people could submit any three of the prescribed 14 documents as proof and get the passports, he said.

Everyday, 400 applications were being received from the 80 recognised travel agents, 500 from e-seva counters, 100 through online registration and 200 from the districts, apart from the PACCs in Tirupati and Vijayawada. By opening special counters at the Haj House, Hyderabad, and regular passport camps outside the capital, we seek to get more number of citizens into our fold, Mr.Bhaskar explained. P.Ashok Kumar, in-charge of the Tirupati PACC, also took part.

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