Ivan D'Souza, secretary of the Karnataka State Pradesh Congress Committee, said on Thursday that the service at the passport seva kendra here continued to be poor and people faced hardship in getting passports.
“Officials have not been providing proper service at the kendra despite directions by the Ministry of External Affairs. It is because of this slackness, the Ministry has not been able to achieve the objective for which such kendras have been set up,” Mr. D'Souza told presspersons.
Mr. D'Souza said people were still not being provided basic facilities such as drinking water at the kendra.
ADVERTISEMENT
He said that the applicant was not being allowed to enter the counter at the kendra along with his associate to help him fill the passport application.
The kendra was yet to evolve a system to get the police verification certificate on time, he said.
“About 7,000 applications are pending at the kendra for want of verification certificates. I do not know why police have not issued certificates,” he said.
ADVERTISEMENT
Mr. D'Souza said the problems at the kendra here had been brought to the notice of the official concerned. “If no action is taken, we will be forced to bring it to the notice of External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna. We will have to stage demonstrations too,” he added.
He welcomed the recent move of the Ministry to increase the number of appointments given at the kendra from 350 to 500. Mr. D'Souza hoped that the increase in appointments would fasten the process of issuance of passports. He would meet Mr. Krishna and seek a passport seva kendra for Udupi.