Police verification process for passports has gone online in 654 out of 728 police districts in the country under the Passport Seva Project (PSP). These districts have been integrated with the Passport Seva system. That makes police verification for issuing fresh passports and renewal of passports much easier.
Giving this information in response to a query in parliament, Minister of State for the external Affairs Gen Dr V K Singh (Retd) said all the 654 districts have been integrated with the Passport Seva system.
As per January–June 2015 passport services data, the average time taken by states/union territories for police verification is 36 calendar days, which is gradually coming down. The desired time line for police verification is 21 days.
The Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of External Affairs are jointly working on a comprehensive plan to integrate the database of Passport Seva system with the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems (CCTNS) across the country. Thereafter, the time taken for police verification, including in rural areas, would drastically come down.
For police verification of passport applicants, the passport office currently follows the decades-old system of sending verification requests to the District Superintendent of Police’s office. The request further goes to the police station concerned and later an official visits the residence of applicant to verify his/her details.
The time-consuming process of policemen personally visiting homes of applicants will be eliminated once CCTNS database will be integrated with the Passport Seva system.
