The passport office has become a care of address for corruption. It is common for the employees in passport office to take e bribes and when caught by the police, they will be good for a few days but on the fourth day their behavior will be as normal as that of the tail of a dog. It is well known fact that in the past CBI had made rides on the clerical level officers who are taking bribes. As the necessity of the passport has become very common these days, the officials are taking it as a chance and demanding money from the people in the form of bribe. Brokers and lower class employees are involved in taking bribes. Though some measures are being taken by the officials to avoid these problems the applicants had to face the problems.
The main reason behind this is corruption and the other reason is insufficient staff. Daily around 2000 applications are coming to the Hyderabad passport office. Among those 2000 applications, around 400 may be of tatkal and these 400 applications have become a source of side income to the officials. All the ordinary applications can be submitted in the E-Seva centers and in the post offices. The major corruption is seen especially with the people who are in need of the urgent passport. Those people are ready to pay even Rs.5000 – 10, 000 in order to get the passport immediately. The whole process is done with the knowledge of passport office staff. One of the interesting issues is anyone who goes directly without any mediator, their application and the papers that are submitted are rejected by the officials.
Whereas, the applications that are sent by the broker is accepted by the officials. The main reason why people approach the brokers is that they don’t have patience to stand in the long queues. On the other hand the mediators collect Rs.500 to fill the application in online. Workers who are going to Gulf countries for work approach the mediators to send their applications online. One can imagine the range of corruption that around 200 mediators are wandering around the passport office. Daily around Rs.25 lakhs of business is done in the passport office. The passport applicants lost their patience and are saying that no one can bring change in the attitude of the staff.
My suggestion is that no officer/clerical/agents should be allowed to be associated with passport officer for more than a year or so to break the link. I am one of the worst sufferers. I am a physically handicapped person under Section 80U of the Indian Income Tax Act. I have applied for passport along with my wife and my minor daughter whose all documents are filled up by me as also I have submitted the court affidavit as her guardian. Though I received my passport after tremendous effort, my daughter’s and wife’s passports are still help up without any reason so far. Though all payments, including police verification charges, agents’ commission and extra money asked by the agent in this regard.
Shankar Maitra
Mobile No. 9830149113 87/51, A.K. Mukherjee Road,
Kolkata 700090
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