[Resolved]  ICICI Direct - Account Opening — verification officer inferred passport tampered

Responding to an unsolicited call on my cell phone from ICICI Direct associate, I complied with their requirements of providing documentation towards opening the above account with ICICI Direct.

I did draw their attention to my displeasure that last year March 2008 I was disappointed with their processinf my request for a Demat Account with their Bank - as all i received from them was an email at my personal id saying that my application was rejected. No telephone call - No explanations given.

Their response now was an apology. Everyone needs a second chance and as I was also keen on trading I agreed to fill in the account opening form.

On their advice to get my original PAN CARD and PASSPORT for verification on 24th April 2009, the Verification Officer RAJU scrutinizes my PANCARD and PASSPORT alphabet to alphabet with the original placed next to the xerox copy. Great verification.

What is not great is that he infers that my passport is tampered with by saying that there is a different coloured ink used in the word 'MUMBAI' in my passport . The height of this is that this page is originally laminated by the PASSPORT OFFICE and is also ten years old.


Further he was seeking my approval to make a remark that a different coloured ink was used and he wanted me to sign in acknowledgement of his remark, thus trying to implicate me by volutarily admitting that my passport is tampered with.

I refused the account opening and will consider it illegal on the part of ICICI Direct to debit any amount from my account towards the account opening.

I am willing to take this further to any extent, just so that ICICI Bank, does not harras its customers with the likes of Verification Officers who do not know how to identify an original document and suspect that the original Government document is Fake.

Verification in its proper sense is sending the xerox to the concerned Government Department to check on its authenticity and not trust some half-baked so called 'VERIFICATION OFFICER' who tries to implicate geniune citizens with his wierd remarks