The Hyderabad Regional Passport Office has received the best passport office award for 2012—13 from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) for rendering outstanding services to the applicants.

“The office has shown the best performance in the past two years and won the special jury award at the Regional Passport Officers conference in New Delhi on June 25,” regional passport officer K Srikar Reddy told reporters today.

Hyderabad RPO stood on the first position in the country by processing maximum 5.93 lakh passports during FY 2012—13 followed by Bangalore at 4.31 lakh, he said adding the figure will cross the 6 lakh mark this fiscal.

Andhra Pradesh stood third in the list of states issuing/ processing maximum number of passports with 7.31 lakh while Kerala stood first (9.21 lakh) followed by Tamil Nadu (7.82 lakh).

Reddy also thanked the police officials for speeding up the police verification process which was being done in two—week time (normally done in 21 days) and in some districts like Nellore where it was done in only 3 days.

The online payment system for passport applicants, wherein (online payment based appointments) applicants will be required to make payment at the time of booking appointment on the MEA website, will be launched at different Passport Seva Kendras in the state from tomorrow, Reddy said.

“To resolve the issue of non—availability of appointments and to reduce no—shows of applicants, MEA has launched online payment system for booking appointments,” he explained.

The senior passport official advised the public not to fall prey to agents and submit fake documents to the passport office. He further said an inquiry has been ordered in connection with a DRDO official here issuing as many as 50 verification certificates within six months.

In another instance, a forged letter (certificate) in the name of the 9th Additional Metropolitan Magistrate was submitted, however, after verification it was found that the magistrate did not issue any such certificate, he said.

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