Passport services to get user-friendly

source :Daniel P George, TNN, May 23, 2010, 04.10am IST


CHENNAI: Services at the regional passport office (RPO) will soon get better, with applicants getting SMS alerts on passport status and interviews. The RPO is shifting from the Passport Control Issuance System to a state-of-the-art Passport Management System, an upgradation that will cost Rs 35 lakh and be operational by June 1.

RK Mishra, director (technical) of National Informatics Centre (NIC), said the system will be faster and more user-friendly than the existing one. NIC officials are presently in Chennai, involved in data conversion and installation of new hardware. A training programme for all passport office employees is slated for May 29.

"The state-of-the-art software and server called the Passport Management System will result in improvement in overall work output at the RPO in Chennai," said V Suresh, principal analyst at the National Informatics Centre, who is overseeing the transition to the new system in Chennai.

What prompted the move to shift to a new software was storage constraints, considering the database has been growing at over 200% with around thousand passport applications being received per day, Suresh said. The system would be integrated with the immigration office to lookout for wanted persons either arriving or departing from the city. Chennai will be the 20th passport office to move to the new system out of the total 37 passport offices in the country.

Welcoming the move, K S Daulat Thameem, deputy passport officer, said, "We are happy that we are moving to a faster and effective software and hope to increase the output". The regional passport office in Chennai with 103 officers and staff members, receives a footfall of over 4,000 daily. In 2009, 2,36,000 applications were received and 2,20,000 passports issued from Chennai.