Citizens Abroad To Soon Get Passport In Less Than 48 hours As Indian Missions Linked With Data Centre In India

The Minister of State for External Affairs, General V K Singh said at Washington that Indian missions across the world could soon issue passports in less than 48 hours to citizens abroad, addressing a meeting after launching the ‘Passport Seva’ project at the Indian Embassy, reports Indian Express.

The passport centres at Indian missions have been digitally linked with the data centre back at India, which would speed up the process of issuing the passport, he said.

India is all set to have the best passport services in the world, the minister said, "there has been a significant easing of rules for passport applicants," he added.

The ‘Passport Seva’ project was first launched in the UK last month. In the US, the project was first rolled out in New York on 21 November, followed by Washington on Saturday (24 November). Indian Consulates at Atlanta, Chicago, Houston and San Francisco would also soon get such facilities. The project would be made available to all the Indian missions across the globe after the UK and the US, Singh said.

The government will issue a new set of passports, they would have all kind of security features and better printing and paper quality, Singh said. However, the Minister clarified that “there will be no change in the colour of the Indian passport,”