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Indian passport is a travel document, not citizenship proof, officials stress
All new passports issued are chip-based. It is now more difficult to generate fake passports as e-passports offer greater reassurance to immigration authorities abroad and make clearances faster
- PUBLISHED: Wed 24 Jun 2026, 6:36 PM
The Indian passport is a travel document and not one establishing citizenship, officials of the Ministry of External Affairs said on Wednesday.
June 24 is celebrated every year as the Passport Seva Divas, to mark the enactment of the Passport Act on June 24, 1967. “A passport is issued after a lot of due diligence, and it is based on documents from several government agencies,” an official told the media.
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Last year, nearly 14 million passports were delivered by the government, added the spokesperson.
India has 545 ‘Passport Kendras’, which issue the documents. S. Jaishankar, the country’s External Affairs Minister highlighted the efficient, transparent, and citizen-centric passport services that the government provides.
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India has also introduced e-passports, with 14.7 million having been issued since the launch last year. The e-passports feature an embedded antenna and radio frequency identification (RFID) chip, containing personal details and biometric data.
All new passports that are issued are chip-based. “It is more difficult to generate fake passports, and the e-passports offer greater reassurance to immigration authorities abroad and make clearances faster,” said the spokesperson.
In the 1980s, it took three to six months to just get a passport for most Indians, and people had to stand in long queues outside the offices that were there in the bigger cities.
Today, the average processing time for an Indian passport is just six working days (it excludes the time taken for police verification, which has also improved dramatically all over the country). The ministry spokesperson said on average a citizen spends less than 45 minutes at the Passport Kendras.
Last month, the Ministry of Home Affairs introduced changes, streamlining the Overseas Citizens of India (OCI) services and strengthened regulatory oversight. OCI cards provide multiple-entry, lifelong visas to persons of Indian origin and their spouses, but it does not grant full citizenship or political rights.
