MEA switches choices to issue orange travel permit, to keep printing last page with address
The Ministry of External Affairs has switched its choice to issue orange-shaded travel papers to ECR-international ID holders. The choice was likewise taken to keep printing the last page of the identification which had the holder’s address.
The move had come in for across the board feedback and was considered classist and biased in a few quarters.
As indicated by an MEA official statement, a gathering led by EAM Sushma Swaraj, after far-reaching exchanges with partners, the MEA has ‘chose to proceed with the act of printing of the last page of the travel permit and not to issue a different international ID with orange shading coat of ECR visa holders’.
The Ministry of External Affairs had reported in an announcement that those with ECR status would be issued orange travel papers.
At present, the candidates who have not passed registration are given ECR stamped visa, which implies that in the event that they need to venture out abroad to a gathering of 18 nations, generally in Gulf, they can leave India simply in the wake of acquiring a ‘Displacement freedom’ endorsement from the workplace of Protector of Emigrants.
MEA representative Raveesh Kumar had stated: “As the last page of the visa won’t be printed now, the international ID holders with ECR status will be issued an identification with an orange coat and those with non-ECR status would proceed with a blue travel permit.”
ECR is for the most part required by less talented laborers.
Congress President Rahul Gandhi had stated: “Treating India’s transient specialists like peons are totally inadmissible. This activity exhibits BJP’s biased outlook.”
The move had likewise been condemned by Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan. “The choice will segregate between normal laborers and taught ones,” Vijayan said. This would prompt a circumstance wherein the individuals who have not passed the tenth standard would be considered as peons, Vijayan had said. “You can see such people even in the business group .. on the off chance that different shading visa is issued to them and they travel to another country, it would make a feeling that they are peons.”
They may even misfortune the opening for work, he had contended. The move would have affected an expansive number of Indians who have not crossed the Class 10 limit and go to the Gulf as untalented works.
Read the full official statement:
1. A choice was taken by the Ministry of External Affairs on the proposals of a three-Member Committee involving authorities of MEA and the Ministry of Women and Child Development, not to print the last page of Passport Booklet. MEA additionally took the choice to issue an international ID with orange shading coat to visa holders with ECR status, with a view to help and help them on need premise.
2. The MEA has gotten a few individual and aggregate portrayals asking for to reexamine these two choices.
3. At a gathering led by Smt. Sushma Swaraj, External Affairs Minister, on 29th January 2018, within the sight of General (Retd.) Dr. V.K. Singh, Minister of State for External Affairs, the choice of the MEA on both these issues was checked on in the light of these portrayals. After far-reaching exchanges with the different partners, the MEA has chosen to proceed with the present routine with regards to the printing of the last page of the visa and not to issue a different international ID with orange shading coat to ECR identification holders.
