In the latest addition to the controversy surrounding Leander Paes and his former partner Rhea Pillai, the Mumbai Regional Passport Office (RPO) has confirmed that it has no record of the tennis star losing his passport or being issued a new one after 2008.
In the latest addition to the controversy surrounding Leander Paes and his former partner Rhea Pillai, the Mumbai Regional Passport Office (RPO) has confirmed that it has no record of the tennis star losing his passport or being issued a new one after 2008.
The issue cropped up in May last year when Paes filed a petition in the Bandra court seeking custody of their child. Paes has claimed that he had lost his passport in March 2014, while he was in US. However, as per PRO, a passport bearing number Z1779618 had been issued in the player’s name in February 2008 which is valid till 2018.
H Fulpadia, deputy passport officer at PRO, said, “We have not received any information about loss of Paes’s passport. Even if it was lost in the US and he was issued a travel document or another passport by the Indian embassy there, we would have been informed and we would have updated our records.”
The official said the passport in their record carries Paes’s spouse name as Pillai. However, Paes's spokesperson claimed that the player lost the document last year in US and that a new passport was issued to him there which is valid till 2024.
“As far as mention of Pillai's name in the previous passport is concerned, we believe it was an administrative lapse by the passport officials. The error was committed in one of the many booklets issued to him of the passport as he travels a lot. The duo never got married and there are no documents to prove it either. The correction was made in the new passport issued in 2014,” the spokesperson said.
RPO officials have rubbished the lapse claim saying the details in a passport are based on data provided by the applicant. An official said, “If at all there was an error, he should have approached us. Without proof, we don't put such details in an important document like passport.”
The mystery further deepens. Pillai in her complaint has attached a copy of a sworn affidavit given by Paes to the US embassy in 2009 for his visa. The affidavit shows Pillai as his wife. “I am not aware of this,” said Paes’s spokesperson.
The matter became controversial, after Pillai approached Bandra police and RPO alleging that the tennis star had given false information in this passport. She said Paes’s passport (No. Z1779618) mentions her (Pillai) as his spouse, while in the petition filed before the Bandra court he has claimed that he has never married Pillai.
Following a query, the PRO had recently replied to the police that Paes’s passport was valid till February 2018 and showed Pillai as spouse. There is no mention of any lost passport, the PRO said.
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