Bank passbooks of private banks valid for passports

Manav Mander

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, February 23

Giving address proof while applying for a passport will now become much easier as passbooks of private banks will now be accepted as address proof.

As per the existing provisions, only passbooks/statements of bank account of Public Sector Banks were accepted as one of the valid documents for proof of address for submitting a passport application.

Rakesh Agrawal, Regional Passport officer said, “From now onwards the applicants can submit the passbook of private banks like HDFC, AXIS, ICICI, Kotak Mahindra, Yes Bank and many other private banks as well as Gramin banks for address proof. This will greatly help the applicants.”

In case of any doubt about the status and name of any particular bank, the same may be ascertained from the updated website of the Reserve Bank of India, he added.

The Ministry of late has been receiving references for inclusion of photo passbook issued by the scheduled Private Indian Banks as well as Regional Rural Banks in addition to scheduled Public Sector Banks for address proof.

“The matter was examined by the Ministry and it has been decided that henceforth passbooks containing photo of applicants issued by scheduled public sector banks, scheduled private sector Indian banks and regional rural banks are authorized by the Reserve Bank of India will be accepted as proof of address and photo identity.