Attestation facility for job seekers to start at Mumbai RPO

Mumbai: The facility of attestation/ apostille of educational and other relevant documents of job seekers would be made available at the Regional Passport Office (RPO) here after Ministry of External Affair's decision to decentralise the process.

Regional Passport Officer, Mumbai, Swati Kulkarni said the process will come into force from October 13.

"The MEA has decided to decentralise the work of attestation/apostille of documents of Indian citizens. Those residing in Maharashtra, Dadra Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu can now apply for it at three outsourced attestation application centres and our office will legalise their documents from October 13 onwards," Swati told PTI.

The attestation application centres are Trade centre in G Block of BKC, M/s Superb enterprises, Ashoka Shopping Centre near GT hospital and BLS International Services in Navi Mumbai.

Earlier, applicants seeking jobs abroad, needing to get their relevant documents attested, had to travel to Ministry of External Affair's office in New Delhi for the purpose.

MoE recently decentralised the process and entrusted various RPOs in several states to carry out of the process.

Apostille is endorsement of documentation done in 105-member countries of the Hague convention which obviates the need for legalisation of foreign public documents.

RPOs at Guwahati, Chennai, Hyderabad are among the ones that have already been entrusted to carry out attestation and apostille.

"Applicants would need requisite approval from the General Administration Department and thereafter, they would have to file their applications at the three outsourced attestation application centres. From there, applications would be forwarded to us and we will legalise their documents," said Kulkarni.

Beside Mumbai, the facility will also start at Chandigarh, Goa, Bangaluru and Trivandrum RPOs.

"This move would benefit lakhs of overseas job seekers from the entire Maharashtra and the two neighbouring Union Territories," she added.