Passport plea: Senate panel seeks explanation from authority

Says MQM chief has written a letter to the foreign ministry about issuance of a passport.

ISLAMABAD:

A Senate panel on Monday questioned the authorities for not issuing a passport to Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) chief Altaf Hussain as it sought details of diplomatic and blue passports issued during the last five years.

The Senate Standing Com­mittee on Interior and Narcotics Affairs questioned Directorate of Immigration and Passports (I&P) as to why the MQM chief was not issued a passport despite his application.

The committee’s chairman Senator Talha Mehmood said the MQM chief Altaf Hussain had written a letter to the foreign ministry about the issuance of a passport. However, interior ministry officials claimed they were unaware of any such letter, he added.

Speaking at the occasion, MQM Senator Tahir Mashadi said Altaf Hussain was a Pakistani citizen and a passport should be issued to him whether he returned to Pakistan or not.

Immigration and passport officials present at the meeting claimed that Altaf Hussain had not formally applied for the passport as yet. But the committee asked the directorate to submit a report in this regard.

The committee also asked the director general of immigration and passports to provide within a week the list of people to whom they issued diplomatic and blue passports. It also asked the authority to inform the Senate panel about the criteria under which diplomatic passport were issued.

The session became interesting when Information Minister Senator Pervaiz Rashid said the people at the passport directorate had been issuing blue and diplomatic passports to people including their companions, property dealers and friends.

“The present government has stopped this trend,” he said, adding that in the past unnecessary passport offices were formed on political basis and a list of these should be presented before the committee.

Senator Talha Mehmood said the interior ministry should conduct an inquiry about the huge backlog of passports in the I&P directorate and should take strict action against those responsible.

The acting director general for immigration and passports, Muhammad Safdar, informed the committee that since 2004 the immigration and passports directorate generated Rs24.421 billion revenue. “However, the government has allocated Rs2,560 million during 2012-2013 against the revenue of Rs16,306 million,” he said.

Senator Tahir Mashadi said as the immigration and passports directorate had produced huge revenue for the government, the finance ministry must fulfill its demands on a priority basis.

Sharing details, he said the directorate had 93 regional offices across the country and 24 Pakistan foreign missions were issuing machine readable passports (MRP) while four Pakistani missions were enabled with a MRP system and would be operational by June 30.

“Between 2008 and 2013, some 902 individuals who were either not Pakistani citizens or whose nationality was in doubt, had illegally obtained Pakistani passports,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 13^th, 2014.