By IANS,
New Delhi : The government has decided to interlink all offices issuing visas to foreigners for real time sharing of information following the controversy over issuance of the travel document to Canadian of Pakistani origin Tahawwur Hussain Rana, the terror suspect arrested in the US.
The purpose of the project is to ensure that information is shared instantly “and decisions can, therefore, be taken on a real time basis,” Home Minister P. Chidambaram told reporters here Tuesday while sharing with them the monthly progress report of his ministry.
“The FRROs (Foreigners’ Regional Registration Offices) and the foreigners’ division are on a stand-alone basis. As a result, there is no real time information sharing,” he admitted.
“When a visa is issued, as it was issued by consulate general in Chicago, there was no real time information,” Chidambaram said.
To avoid the recurrence of such lapses, “what we need is the real time sharing of information among all the offices which are dealing with foreigners…to ensure that kind of connectivity takes place so the information is shared instantly and discussion can be taken on real time basis,” the home minister said.
The move to interlink the offices comes in the wake of reports that the Indian consulate in Chicago issued a visa to Rana, a Canadian of Pakistani origin, without referring his case to the home ministry.
The consulate had said there was no need to refer cases where an individual was a Pakistani citizen but had become a citizen of another country and surrendered his Pakistani citizenship.
Home Secretary G.K. Pillai, who was also present at the news conference, said: “There will be a connectivity between all…the offices of Foreigners’ Division, FRROs, the ministry of external affairs and all the missions abroad will be interlinked for real time connectivity. That is the primary whole purpose of this project.”
Rana was arrested by the US’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) along with David Coleman Headley, a Pakistani-born US citizen, on the charges of plotting terror attacks in India on behalf of the Lashkar-e-Taiba militant outfit.
Indian investigators are also probing their suspected involvement in the 26/11 Mumbai terror strikes, which left 166 people dead.
Chidambaram said there was no Indian team visiting the US to interrogate the two.
“On the contrary, an FBI team is visiting India in the next few days,” he said.
“A large number of investigators are out in the field probing every lead that we have been able to get. And the probe is progressing satisfactorily and quite speedily,” he added.