Indian Embassy outsources passport service to new company.

Washington, Apr 27, 2013, (PTI) :

The Indian Embassy in the US today announced to outsource its passport related services to a new company for all its diplomatic missions in the country.

BLS International will replace the existing VFS global Ltd and start receiving applications for Indian passport related services from May 7, according to a public announcement by the Indian Embassy here.

Besides the Indian Embassy in Washington, passport related services are handled by the five other Indian Consulates in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Atlanta and Houston.

"The Services of the current service provider VFS Global Ltd will be terminated w.e.f. May 7, 2013 at all Embassy/Consulate locations in USA. VFS Global Ltd will continue to receive passport applications in person until May 6 and by mail until May 3, 2013," the Embassy statement said.

Headquartered in New Delhi, BLS International specialises in outsourcing of visas, passports and attestation applications in India as well as abroad.

According to the passport outsourcing tender issued by the Indian Embassy on March 1, the outsourcing agency would be responsible for collection of passports, supporting documents, and prescribed application fees from the applicants.

In 2012, the Indian Embassy in Washington and the five Consulates had handled 78,836 passport related applications.

The Indian Consulate in New York had received the maximum number of 25,430 passport related applications, followed by San Francisco (20,186), Houston (12,711), Washington (9,620) and Chicago (9,435).

Saudi sponsors to pay for deporting illegal workers

Saudi Arabia will make sponsors and employers of foreigners working illegally in the country pay the cost of deporting them, under new rules approved by the cabinet, the Saudi Gazette reported on Monday.

The world's top oil exporter is cracking down on illegal expatriate workers in an effort to move more Saudi citizens into private sector jobs. Tens of thousands of people have been deported in recent months as government inspectors descended on businesses that have long bent the rules to hire foreigners, who are often paid less than Saudi nationals.

Last week Labour Minister Adel al-Fakieh said the kingdom would impose tough penalties, including jail sentences and fines, on owners of small businesses which harboured illegal workers.

The new cabinet ruling will end the government's responsibility for paying deportation costs, reported the Saudi Gazette, a major newspaper, saying it had seen an advance copy of the ruling.

Expatriates who violate labour laws, or overstay haj and umrah pilgrimage visas, will be deported and then banned from returning to Saudi Arabia, it added.

Officials in Yemen and the Indian state of Kerala, from which many of the roughly 9 million foreigners in the kingdom come, have expressed concern about the impact of deportations. Many other expatriates come from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, the Philippines, Ethiopia and Arab countries.

Under Saudi law, all expatriate workers must be sponsored by a Saudi company or individual. Many workers then leave that employer to look for a better job elsewhere, or set up their own businesses. Some sponsors connive in violating the rules, charging expatriates whom they do not employ money to renew their visas.

The newspaper said sponsors and haj and umrah travel companies which failed to report missing workers or pilgrims would bear deportation expenses.

Pilgrims who are reported missing would have to pay their own airfares home. For workers reported missing, deportation costs would be paid by the company for which they were working or, if the workers had set up their own business, they would pay costs themselves.

Companies or individuals registering "cover-up" businesses, which are illegally owned by foreigners while ostensibly being the property of a Saudi sponsor, would be banned for five years from recruiting foreign workers.

Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/saudi-sponsors-to-pay-for-deporting-illegal-workers/1/267054.html

Passport seekers face problems at Ghaziabad

IANS  |  Ghaziabad  April 22, 2013  

Passport seekers from western Uttar Pradesh Monday complained of poor service at an application processing centre managed here by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). 

People from across 13 districts of western Uttar Pradesh are forced to remain in queues for seven to eight hours to get their applications processed as there is an inadequate number of working counters, it has been alleged. 

They also complained of lack of sitting arrangements even for the aged passport seekers and adequate arrangement of water at the Passport Seva Kendra (PSK) situated at Pacific Business Park in Sahibabad area here.

Nikhil Gautam from TCS claimed that "Beyond the entrance of our office, we cannot provide facilities to the visitors while at A level counters just at the entrance, we try to clear the queue at the earliest hence there is no need for the sitting facilities". 

Additional Regional Passport Officer Veena Sharma refused to speak.

On the other hand, passport seekers made a slew of complaints against the service provider and poor infrastructure at the centre.

 

"We reached at 9 a.m. and it took 8 hours to process our application at three counters. During these eight hours my 65-year brother Niyamat Ali had to wait outside without any facilities for visitors," said Liyaquat Ali from Saharanpur. 

 

Old and young people are forced to sit on the floor without any water facility, Ali said. 

"We have 29 counters at A level, eight counters at B level and six counters at C level to deal with about 500 to 600 applicants a day. We do admit there is a bottleneck at C level so the applicants are suffering slackness in the process," Gautam of TCS admitted.

Contradicting Gautam's claim Rajiv of Aligarh, who was hearing the conversation, claimed that Gautam was hiding facts.

He alleged that at "B level there are only four counters operational and at C level only three counters are operational".

The service provider agency process the application at A level and the rest is dealt by government officials directly, claimed a source inside the office and the bottleneck is there.

"It was good when the office was at CGO Complex in Ghaziabad where regional passport officer was readily available but here at this corner no one is to look at the applicants problem," said Hamid Ali of Bulandshahr.

India Post, Tata Consultancy Services to sign Rs 1,400 cr IT deal on Monday

IT major Tata Consultancy Services has bagged the Rs 1,400-crore project of India Post for computerising counter operations and the two parties will sign a pact on Monday, a top government official has said.The project is divided into two parts --two years for implementation and five years of maintenance.

"We will sign agreement with TCS on Monday for computerising counter operations under core system integration of India Post. Around Rs 1,400 crore has been earmarked for the project," Department of Post Secretary P Gopinath said.

The government has approved Rs 4,909 crore for phase II of modernisation of post offices under which the department is gearing up for providing real time core banking services as well.

The Indian IT companies, which earn major part of their revenues from foreign markets especially the US and Europe, are betting big on the domestic government projects.

TCS had also bagged the mission mode e-governance project and Passport Seva Project from the MEA in October, 2008.

Infosys has bagged a 700-crore project that would help India Post transform its banking and insurance operations cross 1,50,000 post offices in the country.

The Department of Post has started deploying modern technology solution to develop core banking capability across post offices. As part of modernisation, it has set a deadline of March 31 to computerise all department post offices.

The IT modernisation project approved the Cabinet was divided in three parts: Pilot, Phase I and Phase II.

In phase 1, DoP has to roll out modern IT solution in six circles namely, Assam, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh.

The project included computerisation of all post offices, core banking solutions including installation of 1000 ATMs, mail tracking, customer service call center and introducing eCommerce solution, handheld devices for post masters for update on services like mails, money order etc.

Some activities like installation of ATMs under Phase 1 are yet to be completed by the department.

 

Under phase II of the IT project, DoP has plans to roll out modern IT solution in rest of the country.

 

Source : http://www.financialexpress.com

Ghost images to curb fake passport menace

TH, BANGALORE, April 13, 2013

Your passport will soon sport additional security features," K.J. Srinivasa, Regional Passport Officer, Bangalore, told The Hindu the new-look passport, which will be printed from April 15, is aimed at preventing criminals from printing fakes.

The new variant of the passport, which will be issued by all Regional Passport Offices (RPOs) in the country, will have the personal particulars of the passport holder, hitherto printed on the front inner cover page, shifted to page 1 of the document. A ‘ghost’ image of the passport holder will be imprinted on the page bearing the personal particulars, below the passport number.

The sign and seal of the Regional Passport Officer, hitherto appearing on page 1, will be shifted to the front inner cover.

The family details of the passport holder — names of father, mother and spouse — and address, which hitherto appeared on the back inner cover, will be shifted to the penultimate page of the passport document — page 35 in of 36-page passport booklet.

Apart from stymieing criminals from printing fake passports, the changes will also help prevent smudging of the document because of inkjet printers. Moreover, in the old passport, reproduction of the passport holder’s photograph was not of a very good quality.

Dr. Srinivasa however clarified that existing passports will be valid till their expiry date.

Printing is on

He said the printing of the new passport was already on in different RPOs such as Delhi, Chandigarh and Patna with the new security features. “We were waiting for the old stock to be exhausted, which happened today (Friday). We will start printing from Monday,”he said.