Passport Delayed By 45 Days? Mumbai RPO Directs No-Appointment Walk-Ins Amid Rs 2,500 Fee Hike Shock

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— Regional Passport Office, Mumbai (@rpomumbai) June 25, 2026

Applicants who have already scheduled online appointments for a later date may also walk-in if their applications have been pending for over 45 days.

Passport gets costlier

This announcement comes on the heels of the government hiking the fee for getting a new passport to Rs 2,500 from Rs 1,500, with tatkal passports now costing up to Rs 6,000. The rules will come into effect from 1 July, 2026, according to a notification published by Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on June 20.

Currently, the application fee for a fresh passport or reissue of a passport containing 36 pages is Rs 1,500 while for tatkal it is Rs 3,500 for the same category.

The application fee for an ordinary fresh passport or reissue of a passport containing 60 pages has also been hiked up to Rs 6,000 from Rs 2,000 and Rs 6,000 for tatkal from the earlier Rs 4,000 for the same category.

Fresh passport applications for children up to eight years and senior citizens above 60 can be availed at a 10 per cent discount. On the other hand, reissue of a lost or damaged passport will now set you back by Rs 7,500 for a 36-page book (up from Rs 5,000 earlier), and Rs 8,500 for a 60-page book compared to Rs 6,000 previously.

The notification released on Thursday also issued a Schedule which will substitute the “Schedule IV to the Passports Rules, 1980”. The revised schedule mentions two sub-categories — for applicants (18 years of age and above/minors aged between 15 to 18 years, if applied under this category); and minor applicants (below 18 years of age).

Why has the passport fees increased?

A note under the fee structure column on the government’s passport application website states: Fee schedule would be restructured after the nationwide rollout of the Passport Seva Project.

The Passport Seva Project was launched in 2010 in partnership with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). The government does not fund this project up-front, and pays per-transaction fees directly to TCS, which is then offset by the application and processing fees paid by citizens. The private partner bears the initial capital costs.

TCS was selected as the service provider in May 2008 for the creation of a centralised IT system for outsourcing all front-end passport services, which then permitted the private partner to levy a Service Charge for each service.

Passport not proof of citizenship

The key travel document has been in the news in recent days.

Ministry of External Affairs recently stated that the passport is just a “travel document” and not a proof of citizenship.

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) is the entity that authorises and determines citizenship. The passport is solely a document issued by the MEA, and citizenship does not fall under its jurisdiction.

Former Indian diplomat Veena Sikri told The Indian Express, “A passport serves as a travel document and a document of nationality for international travel, but it is not, in itself, a legal document that confers citizenship.”

So, while a passport allows a person to travel internationally, it only verifies their credentials that have been verified by the government, thus confirming one’s nationality. However, citizenship is the legal status arising from birth, parentage, domicile, or naturalisation.