Long wait to coming soon
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: February 25 , 2014 -
'State to have own passport office soon', 'Passport office at Imphal soon', 'Passport office in the pipeline', 'Passport office to be set inside Old Assembly complex', etc, etc, are some of the news headlines in the newspapers that the people of Manipur have become quite familiar for the last many years.
But there has been no sign of any passport office coming up in the State or any serious efforts from the side of the State Government towards realising the long cherished dream of the people to have a passport office of their own in Manipur.
This is in spite of the fact that the public of Manipur have been demanding setting up of at least a Passport Seva Kendra for the last many years and the State Government has been consistently giving the assurances that a passport office would be coming up very soon.
But this 'very soon' has taken rather longer than expected in coming.
After the launch of the Passport Seva Project (PSP) by the Ministry of External Affairs way back in May, 2010 taking into consideration of the growing demand for passport and related services, many smaller towns across the country like Shimla, Bareilly, Gorakhpur, Nizamabad, Sikar, Ambala, etc, have their own passport offices today.
But the people in Manipur have to still depend on the Regional Passport Office at Guwahati or through the local middlemen, thereby compelling to spend more money than what is actually required for making a passport.
From what Muktesh K. Pardeshi, Joint Secretary in charge of PSP and Chief Passport Officer in the Ministry of External Affairs, had stated during the inaugural function of the two day-long Passport Camp at Ist Manipur Rifles banquet hall on February 24, it is more that crystal clear that the Ministry had already given its approval for setting up of a passport office in Manipur long ago, but the necessary works for setting up of the said office are yet to be initiated.
So, our question is, what is the State Government waiting for when it has even claimed to have identified the site for opening the passport office?
Passport is an essential travel document for people going abroad not just for touristic purposes, but also for other purposes like education, medical treatment, business or simply family visits, and for a State like Manipur where an increasing number of people have spread across the globe and many sports persons and cultural troupes have to be always on the move, to have an own passport office in the State, even if it is mini Passport Seva Kendra, is becoming an urgent necessity.
This is a fact that the Government of Manipur should not remain on denial mode any longer.
When the Chief Passport Officer himself has noticed how passport is becoming so important for so many people in Manipur today after the entry to the camp venue had to be restricted as the application forms brought as token for the two-day long passport camp exhausted in no time, why the State Government has to drag its feet from initiating necessary consultation with the Ministry for opening a passport office in Manipur at the earliest rather than allowing the people to be 'extorted' continually by some middlemen in the name of passport services?
Or, is it because of the same 'usual connections' between the Government officials including the Ministers and these middlemen? Who knows, anything is possible in Manipur.
* Comments posted by users in this discussion thread and other parts of this site are opinions of the individuals posting them (whose user ID is displayed alongside) and not the views of e-pao.net. We strongly recommend that users exercise responsibility, sensitivity and caution over language while writing your opinions which will be seen and read by other users. Please read a complete Guideline on using comments on this website.