Post Office Passport Seva centres in 5 Rajasthan districts by Feb end

Jaipur: Rajasthan will have Post Office Passport Seva Kendra (POPSK) in five districts by February end for delivering passport related services across the state.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has approved one centre each in Kota, Jaisalmer, Jhunjhunu, Bikaner and Jhalawar in the state.

"We have finalised sites in Kota and Jhalawar. We have to start the kendras by February 28, which is the deadline," Regional Passport officer, Vivek Jeph told PTI here today.

The Ministry of External Affairs and the Department of Posts (DOP) had earlier decided to join hands to deliver passport-related services to the citizens.

Enthused by success of two pilot projects on utilising the Head Post Offices as Passport Seva Kendra, the Centre had decided to scale up this programme by opening 56 such facilities across the country in various states including Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Jharkhand and West Bengal.

Once fully operational, applicants who apply for their passports on-line through Passport Portal will be able to schedule appointment at the respective POPSK centre to complete the formalities, the MEA said last week.

The pilot project between the MEA and DOP had started in Mysuru and Dahod (Gujarat), on January 25.