Posted on: 05-08-08 10:17:49
You are required to carry your passport to the CIC Office when you visit them to write the exam. They need to see it to verify the absences from Canada, mentioned in your citizenship application. Whether it is an expired passport or a valid passport does not matter as they are basically looking at passport(s) held by you eversince you became a landed immigrant.
Why do you want to lose your passport when you have one? Be truthful and if you are meeting the citizenship eligibilty, it will just a matter of time when you would own a Canadian passport.
Incase you need any help in filling up the forms, you can visit any settlement agency in your neibourhood and the staff can assist you in completing the application.
Best wishes
Praveen Kalra
Settlement Worker
Dixie Bloor Neighbourhood Centre
315-1420 Burnhamthorpe Rd. East
Mississauga, ON. L4X 2Z9
Phone: 905-629-1873 Extn. 244
Fax : 905-629-0791
email : pkalra@dixiebloor.org
web : www.dixiebloor.ca
Quote:
Originally posted by PearlJam
Hi,
I am an Indian living in Canada as a PR. My passport is about to expire soon. I am in the process of applying for Canadian Citizenship and thereby not keen to renew my Indian passport.
I read through the Citizenship guide and requirements as I was curious to know if there ANY requirement that applicants EXISTING passport (in this case: Indian passport) should be VALID at the time of applying for Canadian Citizenship or the Passport is required at ANYstage of citizenship process such as the initial application, citizenship test, oath ceremony etc. I could not find any such requirement or condition.
I am aware that photocopy of the passport MAY be used as photo ID instead of a drivers license in the application.
Do the CIC officers ask us to mandatorily bring our passport any stage for inspection? I would be a bit hesitant to show an expired passport as I would not know how or what would they interpret this as.
An equivalent scenario could be: what if I lost my Indian passport and applied for Canadian citizenship. Assuming I meet all other citizenship requirements, would not having a Passport in hand or losing a passport be a problem?
Has anyone had any such experience or can they share their experience if existing passport is used in the citizenship process?
Thanks!!
I lost my Indian passport during a trip to the US while my citizenship application was in process. I applied for a new Indian passport in the mean time and took it along when I went to write the citizenship test.
They immediately handed over a set of forms and asked me to prove my eligibility since my previous passport was missing and they had no means to find out my absense from Canada.
Trust me, I had a hard time even though everything was in place. It was just that I was not working during the initial few months and that created a big problem. You don't want to go that road. This is what I had to do...
1. I had to go to the bank and ask them for three year old statements.
2. Had to call up my cell phone provider to send me a letter saying that I've been a customer since whenever.
3. Had to go to my previos land lord and ask him to give in writing that I rented his property during that period.
4. Had to go to the ministry of transportation and get a letter from them saying I had a car from so and so period in Ontario.
To sum it all..not a very pleasant situation to be in.
Hope this helps.
If it were that simple to many of us would be loosing our passports just to reach teh finish line faster.
Expired passport is only a concern if you are leaving the country
