The Indian Embassy in UAE has announced the closure of four consular application centres in the country, bringing the total number of the ICACs to 12.
Originally, there were 16 such centres operating across the Emirates since passport, visa and attestation services were outsourced to Al Hind Tours & Travels.
From Thursday, October 22, the services will be discontinued at the four centres due to "administrative reasons". These were the centres located in Musaffah, Al Reem, Dubai Investment Park-l and Sharjah Al Majaz.
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Meanwhile, the centres in Al Danah, Al Ain, Madinat Zayed, Al Dhafra, Ghayathi, Bur Dubai, Indian Association Sharjah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Ras Al Khaimah, Fujairah, Kalba and Khor Fakkan will continue providing services as per usual.
All 12 ICACs operate from 8am to 6pm, and applicants are permitted to enter the centres only 15 minutes before their scheduled appointment. At the Bur Dubai centre, there are 45 counters which reduce wait times.
In a relief for urgent cases, the Embassy announced that Tatkal passport services, newborn applications, Emergency Certificate (EC) requests, and senior citizens aged 60 years and above will be accepted on a walk-in, first-come, first-served basis at all ICACs.
The Government of India revised passport service charges across the UAE effective July 1, marking the first fee increase since 2012. Under the new structure, a normal 36-page passport renewal costs Dh450 (up from Dh285), while Tatkaal (expedited) renewal costs Dh900. For a 60-page passport, normal renewal is Dh630 and Tatkaal is Dh1,080.
Alhind had earlier said that it would charge a fee of Dh19 above the government-mandated fees. This will include all services like photocopy and photography.