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Lawsuit no ground for revoking passport: HC

TIMESNEWSNETWORK

The Times of India 2013/08/07

New Delhi: Even if a criminal case is pending against a person the passport office can’t as a rule revoke his passport, Delhi high court has clarified. The court said a passport can be impounded only in “appropriate cases” where cogent reasons have to be given in writing by the RPO.

Accepting the plea of a man, facing trial in a matrimonial case lodged by his wife, Justice V K Jain directed the passport authority to release his passport which was revoked on the ground of criminal charges against him. The court, however, directed him not to leave the country without its permission and also asked him to attend the ongoing criminal proceedings.

Allowing Manish Kumar Mittal's plea against the passport authority, Justice Jain noted, “The order passed by the Regional Passport Officer directing the petitioner (Mittal) to surrender his passport as well as the order passed by the appellate authority are, hereby, set aside. The respondents (authorities) are directed to release the passport of the petitioner to him forthwith.” The court also asked the RPO to pass an order within eight weeks after giving an opportunity to Mittal to make his stand clear under provisions of the Passports Act.

Demand for passports: region-wise

Passport demand highest from backward UP districts

The Times of India

Kartikeya | TNN

Mumbai: The largest demand for passports in the country is coming not from metros like Mumbai or Delhi but from 48 of India’s most backward districts in eastern and central Uttar Pradesh.

In 2009, the regional passport office (RPO) at Lucknow — which caters to districts like Gonda, Faizabad, Azamgarh and Jaunpur — received an average 1,403 applications daily for fresh passports. The staggering figure put it ahead of RPOs in Kerala, Gujarat, Punjab and the metros which have traditionally been the hubs of passport demand.

Immigrant workers from UP’s districts like Mirzapur, Pratapgarh, Gorakhpur, Ballia etc are known to flock to more developed states in search of livelihood. In states like Maharashtra some regional parties have even violently opposed the migration. But the huge demand for passports from the same poorer districts indicates that they are looking for jobs abroad as well.

In 2009, Uttar Pradesh also overtook Kerala and sent maximum number of workers abroad. This would also explain why the officials at Lucknow RPO find themselves buried under a huge heap of passport applications.

Data maintained by union ministry of overseas Indian affairs shows that until a few years ago barely a few thousand workers from UP sought emigration clearance each year to work overseas. In 2005, the number stood at just 22,558 workers. But thanks to a growing demand for construction workers in the Middle East, the numbers started going up dramatically since 2007.

Consequently, in 2009 more than 1,25,000 workers from UP received emigration clearance from the government, edging ahead of Kerala’s 1,19,000 workers. Apart from the Lucknow RPO, passport offices at Hyderabad (1,330 applications every day), Bangalore (1,226) and Ahmedabad (1,220) saw a huge demand. Overall 37 RPOs across the country received more than five million passport applications in 2009 at an average of 21,089 each day.