Cabinet Spokesperson Minister Vijitha Herath says that the online system to reserve a date for obtaining passports is currently in operation effective from midnight yesterday (05).

The minister explained that, due to an agreement made by the previous government with the passport supplier, it was not possible to import all the required amount of passports at once.

Accordingly, passports are being delivered in batches - 50,000 in October, 100,000 by the end of November, and another 100,000 by the end of December, the Cabinet spokesman said. 

He further stated that the relevant arrangement had been pre-agreed, and no provision was made for bringing in the total required quantity of 750,000 passports at once. The minister also acknowledged the difficulty caused for the public as a result and emphasized the government had been working to resolve the issue. 

“I am happy to say that since midnight yesterday, many people have applied for passports under the category of urgent basis. Many people have applied online in the past few hours, and now there is no queue for the passports”, Herath said.

“Now, the passports for the month of November have been fixed in advance, which means that they will be issued through the department in the same way as the token was obtained.  For those who make new applications, the online system will be available from today to make an appointment. Now we have provided solutions to that situation,” he added.