‘Give NOC to missions abroad within 3 days’

To facilitate Indians living abroad, the ministry of external affairs (MEA) has dirceted regional passport offices (RPO) across the country to confirm particulars of a passport on queries sought by various embassies or missions abroad and provide no-objection certificate (NOC) within 3 days.

The Jalandhar regional passport has received the communication from the ministry on Wednesday. The directive has been issued by the ministry as several passport offices were making delay in giving response to such queries sought by embassies or missions abroad.

“All the passport issuing authorities (PIA) receiving references from mission/posts for confirmation of passport particulars should give priority to the work of verification of particulars from their records and confirm by return fax/e-mail within 3 working days of receiving such references,” the communication said.

It further said that in case the verification required is a confirmation of a photo, a scanned photo should be sent through e-mail.

The RPOs have also been directed that in case the details already exist in PRIDE (passport-related information data exchange), a reply should be sent through e-mail that details are in PRIDE.

Indians with permanent residence (PR) in other countries but carrying an Indian passport get their passport document re-issued from the mission abroad, which is also a passport issuing authority.

People who have gone abroad to study or work have to approach embassies for getting the certification of any travel document whether it is the issuance of fresh passport document or getting passport clearance certificate (PCC).

Jalandhar regional passport officer Harmanbir Singh Gill said they have already started following the instructions of the ministry.