BENGALURU: It was only after reaching the Kempegowda International Airport on July 11 to board a Vande Bharat Mission flight to Singapore via Chennai that Tarun Kumar learnt that his five-year-old son’s passport had expired.
The family, whose native place in Uttar Pradesh, returned to their relative’s house in Whitefield helpless.
Along with wife Ruchi Singal and son Avyan Goyal, Kumar had been on a trip to his brother’s house in Bengaluru recently when they got caught in the lockdown.
The IT professional had to rejoin work at Citibank in Singapore shortly and wanted to take his family along in the special flight run by Air India.
Thanks to smart work by the Regional Passport Office at Koramangala on July 14, the family is set to leave for Singapore by the next Vande Bharat flight shortly.
With all passport offices in Bengaluru set to be shut during the week-long lockdown, the office went out of its way to help the family.
Narrating the tough time they went through, Kumar told TNIE, “We were shocked that his passport had expired. There is one more flight to Singapore on July 19 and we wanted to go by it somehow. I went to the Passport Seva Kendra at Marthahalli on Monday (July 13)."
“My application was rejected as we did not have any local address proof. We had our permanent address in UP. I really did not know what to do. I dropped in a mail to the RPO at Koramangala on Tuesday morning explaining our situation,” he said.
The office got in touch with me immediately and asked me to come over with my son.
“We rushed there on Tuesday afternoon and within two hours we were handed a fresh passport for my son. It was such a surprise for me. I really never expected such a quick response and am extremely grateful to the office for this help,” Kumar said.
Regional Passport Officer, Bengaluru, Bharath Kumar Kuthati said, “We wanted to help the family out somehow as it was a genuine case. Our offices will remain shut for a week from now due to the lockdown. We waited for the family to reach from Whitefield and expedited our processes so that they could travel.”