[Resolved]  Ministry Of External Affairs — Corruption in RPO Patna Office

Dear Regional Passport Officer/Mr Arya,
This is my fourth attempt to higlight the issue to you and I still dont have a response from you.
I do hereby raise a formal complain about the gross inefficiency, corruption and red tapism prevailing in your department that has lead to huge monetary loss and mental agony to me.

My wife had applied for a passport in the RPO Patna office on 12th of August, 2008 with the following details.
File No: A099850
Date Applied: 12th August 2008
Name of the Applicant: Urmila Singh
Date of Birth: 06.06.1957
Address of Applicant: NY 20 /B New Yarpur

I was informed at the time of the application that the passport would be delivered in 45 days. All the formalities of police verification were done. In the month of September, I was informed that the passport would be in our hands by Sep End. However, this did not happen. Months after months, during repeated inquiries, I was always told to wait for a week and these false assurances have been going on for the last 6 months.
The Status currently says:
File Reference Number : PAT-A[protected]Application Date :[protected]
Applicant's Name : URMILA SINGH Applicant's Date of Birth :[protected]
STATUS :

It is to regret that due to unavoidable circumstances the despatch of Passport has been delayed and will now be despatched in a week's time


The same status has been displayed through the last 4 months. As per my knowledge, one week contains seven days and not 150 which approximately has been the situation here and continues to add on. I and my wife need to visit my son who stays in Singapore and due to this delay we have been severely impacted.

In the first week on March, in deep despair, I reached the RPO office and saw several touts hanging around. One of them guaranteed to have my passport delivered in 3 days on payment of Rs 2000. He said that the amount would be used to pay to pay the bribes to all levels and ranks to. If that be the case, I do hereby also raise a complain about the corruption that is existing in/outside RPO Patna office. I am sure you are aware of these and if you are not, I do hereby inform you of this so that you can take appropriate action. I am also reaching out to media to get this entire racket exposed and to ensure that genuine and honest applicants like us do not suffer at because we choose to not file our passports through agents/touts.
If the passport is not delivered before 28th of March, I would like to use my "Right to information" to understand the reason for the delay and the "unavoidable circumstances" that have lead to this delay.

Thanking you and hoping you will do the needful-

Kamal Kumar Singh
Phone:[protected]