MEA Opens First Batch of New Post Office Passport Seva Kendras

The Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) and the Department of Posts (DOP), following the 24th January announcement, has opened the first batch of the Head Post Offices (HPO) in the various States as Post Office Passport Seva Kendras (POPSK) for delivering passport related services to the citizens.

The move makes post offices escape the prospect of extinction and yet extend passport services on a larger scale and to ensure wider area coverage.

The pilot projects for this joint venture between MEA and DOP was inaugurated on 25 January, 2017 at the HPO at Mysuru in Karnataka and at Dahod in Gujarat. One hundred appointments are being released every day for each of these POPSK. Appointments for Mysuru are now available in 10 days while at Dahod it is available the next day.

With the successful pilot, the Government has now decided to scale up this programme by opening 56 POPSKs at the following places in the first batch of expansion:

Now applicants can apply online for their passports through the Passport Portal and get an appointment at the above POPSK to complete the remaining formalities for the passport. Ever since relaxation of rules of passport on 23 December, 2016, nearly 30% surge was seen in demand for passports.

A record number of 53,400 applications were processed on February 7th amd 49,259 of them were fresh applications, the highest since the commencement of the Passport Seva Project. Here is the full list of first batch of post offices which will serve as POPS Kendra: