In order to reduce the application process for students appearing for TOEFL and GRE exams, the Regional Passport Office, Hyderabad, said on Friday that all such students can henceforth fill the passport application online and without waiting for the allotment of a slot, can walk in to any one of the three ‘Passport Seva Kendras’ (PSKs) Begumpet, Ameerpet and Tolichowki in the city along with the necessary documents and submit their applications.
Such a facility has been extended to students because the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) and GRE (Graduate Record Examinations) mandatorily seek the passport number of the candidate to be mentioned in the application forms.
“Earlier, they used to wait for months to get a slot after applying for the passports online due to non-availability of slots.
And even after the acceptance of their regular applications, the students had to wait for some more time for the police verification process to be completed.
Because of this, several students wanting to go abroad could not appear for the TOEFL and GRE exams. Now, with this facility, we hope the process gets speeded up,” K Srikar Reddy, Regional Passport Officer (RPO), Hyderabad, told TOI.
Source : The Times of India