Reentry from India with Passport with Water Damage

[TommySTL]

My wife is an Indian citizen and traveling back to visit family, return trip this coming weekend 22-12-2019. Issue is that her passport got wet, and she was told it now has water damage. It is very much readable to the human eye, but while she was boarding the initial flight out of our home town, the person checking her in wasn't able to get it to scan on the machine. While in India with her family, she is trying to see if she can use it to fly back, but also looking into getting a new passport, but difficult in such a short time frame.

She has her I-551 (10-yr GC), Global Entry, as well as US driver's license with her for other legitimate forms of identification, yet we are worried about her not being allowed because of the passport. She has spoken with officials while in India, and in order to get a new passport while in India, she has to have a bank account (started, have to wait several days to generate a statement), as well as an 'Aadhar', which she said is the equivalent of the USA's social security number. Trouble there is that this wasn't given to her when she was born (born in 1991, assuming prior to this being a form government ID).

If she had been here in the US, we would send it to the conculate in CHicago for a replacement, and it would've been here within a few weeks, but now she is on a short timeline and we both are worried she won't make it back for a while.

Does anyone have suggestions on what we can do in order to either expedite a passport despite not having an Aadhar number, or any other options?

Any advice is very much appreciated, I just want to be able to get my wife back.

Thank you, Tommy

[Mogu]

People are able to get a passport in India in 1-2 days using "Tatkal", which in Indian-speak for rush service (for an additional charge). Aadhar was just invented a couple of years ago. It is not required I believe. I just filled out a passport form and I don't think it was required field (could be wrong though). I did have that # so I put it in.

You don't need a bank account but rather a proof of indian address. I think old passport should do for proof of address. (I understand it has water damage but unless it's bad damage, it should suffice I think. You only need to worry about it for immigration/flights)

To get aadhar, you would need proof of address so it's a vicious circle, which is definitely solved by having a local bank account.

Also, even if they let her board the flight, she would be stopped at the US port of entry for the same reason. Many countries are strict in this regard. It's best to get it sorted before jumping on a plane.

In any case, opt for tatkal rush service.