Srinagar, Apr 19: Scores of Hajj aspirants on Thursday staged a protest outside the Passport Office here against what they termed as apathy and mismanagement in the issuance and disbursing of short validity passports.
 “We were asked to file the affidavit. But no one actually told us what we have to do. We are suspecting some foul play in issuance of these passports. It seems they are just wasting our time. We were not given any receipt after we filed the affidavit,” said Zahid Ahmed, who had come from Sopore to file the affidavit to get a short validity passport for his mother.
 Mess in the Passport Office infuriated the applicants, following which they assembled at Foreshore Road and staged a protest demanding that government should come clear on the issuance of short validity passports.
 Talking to Greater Kashmir Passport Officer Srinagar, Firdous Iqbal assured the aspirants that that their passports are being processed and there is no need to issue separate receipts. “Their passport application numbers are their receipts. They do not need to worry about affidavits,” Iqbal said.
  “Our office has the daily capacity of only 300 to 350 passports. We want to issue as many passports as we can. But better would have been if Hajj Committee would send us  the list of confirm Hajj Pilgrims. Then it was our job to issue passports to them in time,” Iqbal added.
 Despite repeated attempts, the officials at Hajj House did not pick up the phone during office hours.

Lastupdate on : Thu, 19 Apr 2012 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Thu, 19 Apr 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:00:00 IST