Srinagar, July 26 (ANI): External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna today formally launched Passport Seva Kendras (PSKs) in Srinagar and Jammu at a function organized at the prestigious Sher-i-Kashmir International Conference Centre (SKICC) here.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, Union Minister for New and Renewable Energy Farooq Abdullah, Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Ghulam Nabi Azad and other dignitaries were present at the event.
Speaking on the occasion, Krishna underlined the government's firm commitment to providing efficient delivery of passport services to Indian citizens in keeping with the PSP's vision "to deliver all passport-related services to the citizens in a timely, transparent, more accessible, reliable manner and in a comfortable environment through streamlined processes and committed, trained and motivated workforce".
The PSKs in the State have already been operational for over two months and have combined capacity to handle 400 applicants per day. Krishna also laid the foundation stone of the passport bhavan building planned at Rajbagh in Srinagar. The new building will be coming on a one-acre plot and will be housing the Passport Office, Passport Seva Kendra and staff quarters.
The setting up and operationalisation of 77 PSKs in the country has been envisioned under Passport Seva Project (PSP) - a high impact citizen centric e-Governance initiative as part of the national e-governance plan.
The objective was achieved swiftly as the pilot projects had been launched in Bengaluru and Chandigarh in May 2010 and August 2010 respectively and after certification of the Project in January 2011 by the Standardisation, Testing and Quality Certification, the third part audit agency under the department of information technology, the project was cleared for launch across the country only in June 2011. Over 36-lakh passport-related services have been rendered under the new system.
The project has been launched in private public partnership mode.
The intended benefits to common man are service provisioning in a transparent manner within defined service levels, closer and larger number of access points for services, easy availability of a portfolio of on-line services (www.passportindia.gov.in) with real-time status tracking and enquiry, availability of excellent public facilities at PSKs and an effective system of grievance redressal. For assistance one can call toll-free helpline 1800-258-1800.
The Ministry of External Affairs has taken a big lead in the country in improving governance in passport offices by focussing on citizen-centricity, service orientation and transparency and setting up a new benchmark for project execution.
The innovative measures like taking government decisions including verification of requisite documents and granting of passports are done in presence of citizens, which require good co-operation and understanding of citizenry as well. (ANI)
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