Sunday, July 25, 2010

Passport Saga III

Got the passport. In complete ecstasy for a few hours. Till I found out that the ECR (Emigration Check Required) stamp on my passport means that I have to either:

1) go to Protector of Emigrants (PoE) in Delhi/Mumbai/Chennai/Trivandrum, an organization well known for its corruption, who will give me a suspension of ECR or an emigration clearance

2) go to Passport Office, Bangalore once again, stand in line at 9:00 AM, give attested copies of my 10+2 certificates and Rs. 300 to get an ECNR (Emigration Check Not Required) stamp, hopefully on the same day

3) go to UAE only for purposes other than employment, show the return ticket to airport officials

And how did I get the ECR stamp in the first place? ECR stamp would not be affixed if I had submitted a copy of my 10+2 certificate in the application. I had submitted the copies and under Document for ECNR had mentioned 10+2/PUC certificate. However the Bangalore One person said the certificate was not needed since my old passport, which was being submitted with the application, already showed that I was ECNR.

An over-smart Bangalore One official who thought he knew everything better than me will cost me more delay and Rs. 300.

And the request to correct my father's name spelling, which I had submitted to the Passport official after all the waiting in line and getting token and such was not done. And that too, a Bangalore One official had misspelled my father's name. True, I had to check if it was correct when they gave the receipt, but they had to copy the spelling from my application correctly as well.

The only thing the Bangalore One people were concerned about was following their own list of documents to be submitted, to be submitted in triplicate!

Because of them I have a misspelled father's name and an ECR stamp on my passport.

No comments: