Two new passport offices in city soon
Wednesday, 19 May 2010
Fazlur Rahman
The government plans to start setting up two new passport offices in the capital by June as the Agargaon office struggles to cope with the rising demand for travel documents, officials said.
The two passport offices would be set up at Uttara and Jatrabari as part of the government plans to build 19 more regional offices across the country aimed at smoothening the processing of travel documents to reduce public sufferings.
Currently there are 15 regional passport offices across the country. Jatrabari and Uttara offices will be completed as soon as possible to ease pressure on Dhaka regional office located at Agargaon, Department of Immigration & Passports (DIP) officials said.
The officials said finance, establishment and home ministries have already approved setting up the new offices.
The government committee on administrative reforms, the highest executive committee to approve any proposal, has also okayed the proposal, paving the way for starting setting up offices by July this year.
Regional offices will also be set up at Bahaddar Hat in Chittagong, Narsingdi, Tangail, Chandpur, Brahman-baria, Bogra, Kushtia, Manikganj, Munshiganj, Kishoreganj, Cox's Bazar, Feni, Rangamati, Moulvi-bazar, Dinajpur, Pabna and Patuakhali to take the number of total passport offices in the country to 34.
Meanwhile, machine-readable passports (MRPs) system has been introduced at 10 other regional offices after the Dhaka regional office saw huge rush from the applicants for more secure digital passport.
The service has been extended to other regional offices as planned, said a senior DIP official.
He said the tin-shed Dhaka regional office would be turned into a multi-storied building to expand the MRPs facilities and set up more booths as the current structure is not enough to meet the demand.
The present set-up at Dhaka regional office can only process 500 passport applications a day as the MRPs require a number of time-consuming processes.
After receiving an application form, the data mentioned in the forms are processed, papers are scanned, and photograph and fingerprints of the applicants are taken, the DIP official told the FE.
The government plans to start setting up two new passport offices in the capital by June as the Agargaon office struggles to cope with the rising demand for travel documents, officials said.
The two passport offices would be set up at Uttara and Jatrabari as part of the government plans to build 19 more regional offices across the country aimed at smoothening the processing of travel documents to reduce public sufferings.
Currently there are 15 regional passport offices across the country. Jatrabari and Uttara offices will be completed as soon as possible to ease pressure on Dhaka regional office located at Agargaon, Department of Immigration & Passports (DIP) officials said.
The officials said finance, establishment and home ministries have already approved setting up the new offices.
The government committee on administrative reforms, the highest executive committee to approve any proposal, has also okayed the proposal, paving the way for starting setting up offices by July this year.
Regional offices will also be set up at Bahaddar Hat in Chittagong, Narsingdi, Tangail, Chandpur, Brahman-baria, Bogra, Kushtia, Manikganj, Munshiganj, Kishoreganj, Cox's Bazar, Feni, Rangamati, Moulvi-bazar, Dinajpur, Pabna and Patuakhali to take the number of total passport offices in the country to 34.
Meanwhile, machine-readable passports (MRPs) system has been introduced at 10 other regional offices after the Dhaka regional office saw huge rush from the applicants for more secure digital passport.
The service has been extended to other regional offices as planned, said a senior DIP official.
He said the tin-shed Dhaka regional office would be turned into a multi-storied building to expand the MRPs facilities and set up more booths as the current structure is not enough to meet the demand.
The present set-up at Dhaka regional office can only process 500 passport applications a day as the MRPs require a number of time-consuming processes.
After receiving an application form, the data mentioned in the forms are processed, papers are scanned, and photograph and fingerprints of the applicants are taken, the DIP official told the FE.