Inaugurating the “DigiLocker” platform for the “Passport Seva Programme” of the Ministry of External Affairs, Union minister V Muraleedharan on Friday mentioned it might allow residents to submit the paperwork required for passport providers in a paperless mode and they might not be required to hold the unique paperwork. Speaking on the occasion, the minister of state for exterior affairs mentioned the “Passport Seva Programme” has introduced in big transformation in the direction of the supply of passport providers within the nation.
“This has seen a sea change in the last six years. The monthly submission of applications has crossed the one million-mark for the first time in 2017. I am told that more than seven crore passports have been issued through the Passport Seva project till date,” he mentioned.
“We took several significant steps to improve the service delivery experience for the citizens. Not only the work of simplifying passport rules has been achieved but also, we have worked towards taking passport services closer to the doorstep of the citizens,” Muraleedharan added. Noting that beginning passport seva kendras in head submit workplaces was a step on this route, he mentioned on account of that, 426 submit workplace passport seva kendras (POPSKs) have been operationalised and plenty of extra are within the pipeline. This, when added to the 36 passport workplaces and 93 current passport seva kendras, makes a complete of 555 passport workplaces for the general public, the minister mentioned.
To give additional fillip to the citizen-centric strategy and improve the passport service expertise in a paperless mode, “we have now successfully integrated into the DigiLocker platform of the government”, he mentioned. This would allow residents to submit the paperwork required for passport providers in a paperless mode via DigiLocker, Muraleedharan mentioned, including that now, they don’t seem to be required to hold the unique paperwork. “I would also like to add here that as a next step, we are working on the idea of a passport to be included as one of the documents in DigiLocker.
Moving forward, I am confident that this will help the citizens to retrieve the passport whenever required,” he mentioned. In case of lack of passport and whereas reissuance, this facility shall be of nice assist, the minister identified. DigiLocker is a flagship initiative of the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) below the Digital India Corporation (DIC). DigiLocker goals at “digital empowerment” of residents by offering entry to genuine digital paperwork of their digital doc pockets.
The issued paperwork within the DigiLocker system are deemed to be at par with authentic bodily paperwork. “We are also working towards rolling out e-passports for the citizens that are designed to increase security, making it more difficult to tamper with the data recorded on a passport, thereby limiting the chances of fraud,” Muraleedharan mentioned. In the approaching years, biometric passports would assist enhance immigration processes at airports which can be outfitted with computerized e-passport gates, he added. In the upcoming Passport Seva Programme V2.0, using rising applied sciences corresponding to synthetic intelligence (AI), machine studying, chatbot, analytics, robotic course of automation (RPA) will additional ease the expertise of the residents and result in expeditious service supply, the minister mentioned. With the provision of the DigiLocker facility now, the residents wouldn’t have to search for the unique paperwork to hold with themselves when they’re away from residence, he mentioned.
“I welcome all the citizens to use the DigiLocker facility and make the passport application process paperless,” Muraleedharan mentioned. For the benefit of the Indian diaspora overseas to avail passport providers easily, the federal government has built-in 150 Indian missions and posts in overseas nations into the Passport Seva mission, he mentioned.
“The government under (Prime Minister) Narendra Modi has been giving due importance to realising the full potential of Digital India. Digital India is transformational, it brought in public accountability through mandated delivery of the government’s services electronically and minimised the interaction between officials and citizens. “I’m assured that leveraging the DigiLocker for passport providers would guarantee ease of entry for all residents,” the minister added.
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