HYDERABAD: A consumer forum pulled up the Regional Passport Office, Secunderabad for not processing a woman’s passport application without giving any reason and directed it to pay Rs 37,000 compensation to the complainant.
Back in May of 2011, Shravani Budi, a resident of Gandhi Nagar, and her family members applied for passports at the Regional Passport Office (RPO) after paying the requisite fee of Rs 1,100 each. However, Shravani’s application was never processed nor was it sent for police verification. Interestingly, while Shravani’s application was not processed, all her family members received their passports in November, 2011.
Following that Shravani made multiple visits to the passport office to no avail. And that continued till 2012 when the procedure to issue passports changed, doing away with the old ‘legacy’ system to bring in Passport Seva Kendras (PSKs). In March 2013, Shravani again applied for a passport by paying Rs 1,500. But soon after submitting all requisite documents, the officials raised a red flag stating that facts were ‘suppressed’.
The officials said that Shravani did not disclose in her new application form that she had previously submitted an application and asked her to pay Rs 1,000 fine. In her complaint, she alleged that she was put to distress as her passport was not processed.
Malicious intent
The Regional Passport Officer, meanwhile, held that there was no provision under the Passport Act, 1964 to consider the complaint as the issuance of passport is RPO’s prerogative. In a counter affidavit, the officer held that the complaint was filed with malicious intent. The officer also defended the decision saying that there were regular media advertisements and ‘Adalats’ to help those whose applications were rejected, but the services were not utilised.