Extraordinary surge delays passports delivery

Applications on a daily basis jacked up to 40,000 instead of normal range of between 24,000 and 26,000

KARACHI:

The delivery of passports across the country is delayed by more than a month because of the extraordinary surge of those seeking the travel document.

According to sources, citizens in the country’s cities, including Karachi, are again waiting for a long time to receive their passports.

A normal passport delivery is carried out in more than a month instead of 10 days.

Similarly, an urgent passport is being delivered in 15 days instead of five.

Passport delivery through fast track is also being carried out in five days instead of two.

The extraordinary delay is causing difficulties for intending Umrah pilgrims as well as those leaving abroad for work and studies.

The reason for the delay in passport delivery is being said to be an extraordinary increase in the number of people seeking the travel document.

The number of passport applications on a daily basis has jacked up to 40,000 instead of its normal range of between 24,000 and 26,000.

To remove the delay in passport delivery, the printing period has been increased to 24 hours without any day off for the staff.

In the year 2013, Transparency International Pakistan (TIP) had requested the then top judge to take suo motu action on the inordinate delays in providing passports to the citizens by the office that worked under the interior ministry.

According to the procedure, on the payment of an ordinary fee, the passport should be delivered within 12 to 15 working days, TIP said in its plea filed in the human rights cell of the Supreme Court.

It added in its plea that for an urgent fee, the passport should be available in five to seven working days.

It pointed out that the passport office was declared in the National Corruption Perception Survey by TIP as the least corrupt till 2008.

However, the graft whistle blower maintained that the passport office had become highly corrupt in the last five years.

TIP said in its plea that the committed delivery schedule had been violated sometimes because of power outages, breakdown of passport making machines, and since last year due to paper shortage.

it continued that press reports had revealed that the delay of several months in passport delivery was only because of efforts to award the contract to a chosen party without tender.

TIP said the passport office wanted to circumvent the rules laid out by the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) and procure passport paper for five years from a New York-based company on an unsolicited basis.