Diplomatic passports: Senate blocks bill to stop issuing them to state ministers, advisers and secretaries

The Senate on Monday refused to let a bill be introduced that would have stopped diplomatic passports being issued to ministers of state, advisers and senior bureaucrats, Dawn reported. The House rejected the motion to introduce the Passports (Amendment) Bill, 2026.

What the bill proposed

Moved by PTI Senator Faisal Saleem Rahman, who chairs the Senate's interior committee, with Senators Samina Mumtaz Zehri and Saifullah Abro, the bill would have added a new Section 12A to the Passports Act 1974. Under it, no diplomatic passport would be issued, reissued or renewed just because a person holds one of these offices:

• minister of state
• adviser to the prime minister
• special assistant to the prime minister
• federal secretary (except the foreign secretary)
• director general

Anyone already holding one would have had 30 days to surrender it. They could still hold an ordinary or official passport, and people whose job is actually diplomatic would keep their entitlement. The bill argued that a diplomatic passport "should primarily correspond to the nature and requirements of diplomatic or state functions rather than operate automatically as a privilege attached to rank".

Why it failed

State Minister for Interior Tallal Chaudhry opposed it, saying it amended the cabinet's authority. PPP Senator Zamir Hussain Ghumro argued that a minister of state is also a representative of Parliament. Diplomatic passports for these office holders are allowed under the Passports Rules 2021.

Also in the Senate

The House passed the Consumer Protection (Amendment) Bill 2026, moved by BAP's Senator Zehri, by 10 votes to 4 despite the government's opposition, after a heated exchange between PML-N's Nasir Butt and PPP's Sherry Rehman led to a PPP walkout. It also unanimously passed an amendment closing an exemption in Islamabad's ban on plastic book covers.

Your own passport

The bill only touched the red diplomatic passport. For an ordinary passport, the fee depends on the number of pages and how fast you need it: our passport fee calculator gives the current amount.