Delays in passports

Whether the fault is in the machines or the government has run out of paper, neither should take this long to fix.

In announcing its Hajj policy for this year this past week, the government said that Saudi Arabia had increased the quota of pilgrims allowed from Pakistan by nearly 20,000, bringing the total number of pilgrims to over 196,000. With the government accepting applications from April 15, there is likely to be a huge increase in demand for passports in the coming months. Already, a quarter of a million people are waiting for passports that should have been delivered to them. There is every possibility that new applicants will face similar delays and be unable to secure their passports in time for Hajj.

The regular fees for getting a passport is Rs2,100 and is supposed to take 12 working days, while an urgent passport costs Rs4,000 and should be in the hands of the applicant in five working days. Right now, urgent passports are taking longer than regular passports should, while those who have applied for regular passports are having to wait as long as four or five months to secure their travel document. There have been conflicting reports to explain the delay. The official explanation is that some of the limited number of machines that can print machine-readable passports are suffering from technical faults. There have also been allegations that the government has run out of the special illumination paper that is used in passports.

Whatever the true reason for the delays, it is the job of the directorate general of immigration and passports to ensure that the process gets back on track. Getting a passport is the right of every Pakistani and by not giving it to them in a timely manner, the government is impeding this basic right. Meanwhile, the travel plans of Pakistani who may be going abroad to work or study have been left in tatters. With the coming deluge of Hajj applicants, this brewing crisis could soon explode into a public scandal. Whether the fault is in the machines or the government has run out of paper, neither problem should take this long to fix.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 18^th,  2011.