1,2,3..go! and yes passport is find place in your wallet. Applying for and getting passports is all set to be an easy task with the government awarding a Rs 1,000 crore e-project to software giant TCS for issuing the travel document to citizens in just three days.
Passports applied for under the ‘tatkal’ (instant) scheme would be delivered in just one day. Bangalore and Chandigarh would be the first to get the new Passport Seva Kendras by June 2009 on a pilot basis.
This is Tata Consultancy Services’ second largest e-governance deal with the government, which aims to nearly quadruple the number of passport counters to 1,250 from the current 345 and bring the entire process of issuing the travel document online. TCS had earlier bagged the MCA-21 programme of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs for online company registrations.
The online passport delivery service project, awarded by the Ministry of External Affairs, will cut down the process of issuing a new passport to three days once police verification is completed.
TCS will open 77 new Passport Seva Kendras across the country by January 2010 which will be fully computerised. The communication between police and passport office too would be done online and a secure network is being created.
The e-passport project will be implemented within a Buy-Own-Operate-Transfer or BOOT framework with pilot projects operation within 19 months.
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A passport is valid for a period of 10 years in India. After which you have to
Apply for Passport Renewal.
As the passport doesn’t merely give you a traveling allowance,
but it’s also a widely accepted document of your identity, address and age proof.