Passport offices to work on weekend

New Delhi, June 28 (IANS) With the surging demand for passports and glitches in online applications, the external affairs ministry Thursday announced that passport offices will remain open this weekend in various cities including Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, Nagpur and Goa.

The Regional Passport Offices (RPOs), including Passport Seva Kendras (PSKs) under their jurisdiction, will remain open in Delhi and Bangalore Saturday and Sunday, it said.

The passport offices will remain open Saturday in Visakhapatnam, Chennai, Coimbatore, Pune, Nagpur, Goa and Malappuram and Sunday in Surat, Madurai, Ahmedabad, Vadodara (under RPO Ahmedabad) and PSK Tirupati (under RPO Hyderabad).

The applications for all passport related services other than "tatkaal' will be accepted during the passport mela, said the ministry Thursday.

The applicants may fill new applications form physically (available on the website www.passportindia.gov.in) for passport services and may visit the concerned RPO/PSK between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. along with self-attested copies of the requisite documents.

Amid reports of delays in online applications of passports and the growing logjam, the passport offices in seven cities, including Delhi, Ghaziabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Lucknow and Amritsar, worked last weekend also.