Journalism of Courage
WITH the passport offices across the country receiving an increased number of complaints, the Ministry of External Affairs has now come up with a “citizen-friendly and strong” grievance redressal system for quick resolution of the issues faced by applicants.
According to Regional Passport Officer Atul Gotsurve, the Pune regional centre receives nearly 350 complaints every day. “Some applicants send us grievances through email, some call us up on the helpline while others visit the passport office personally to get clarifications or to register a complaint,” he said.
The RPO said the MEA was now providing several channels to address the grievances and an applicant could choose one of them to get things cleared.
“To seek passport-related information, the applicant can use our passport portal, dial the national call centre (1800-258-1800) number, send an email to rpo.pune@mea.gov.in or use the SMS alert system (by paying a one-time enrollment charge of Rs 30). The latest addition to this is our mPassport Seva, a mobile app to track the application status,” said Gotsurve.
Grievances can be registered by sending an email, calling up the help desk or the national call centre, as also by registering at the Centralised Public Grievance Redressal and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS), which enables the application to track the status of the grievance.
“Besides this, applicants can also visit the enquiry counters at the passport office on the Senapati Bapat Road between 10 am to 12.30 pm. We are also organising passport adalats and passport melas regularly to resolve the long pending and complex cases,” said Gotsurve.
