i think you misunderstood what i said....i'm not saying that this wasn't being discussed for a while or that the mou wasn't signed a year prior....the officer said the actual launch of this program in june 2017 was not discussed at any meeting & no one in the ministry had knowledge of this fact till it was announced....

I am leaving in India was the first applicant at RPO Chandigarh in first week of July, got a call from Income Tax department inquiring about the PAN # which I gave him on phone instantly , Me and my wife are leaving in India and filed application in first week of July while my son is leaving in USA and F-1 visa and he is NRI now and has filed application in Dec last week during, but got the call from income tax department for all three applications means they got it this week. That Inspector asked me have u applied for some GEP application, I said yes and then asked the PAN# and asked is there any demand, prosecution, appeal is pending against u ? I said No, I visited the department this morning and met the inspector , he said he has already sent out the report yesterday itself as they got a call from upper boss to send the report on top priority. He said he has sent out the clear report stating no demand pending, no prosecution pending no appeal pending against the applicant !! That"s it , this is the latest update on Feb 22nd !!!
has any update on MHA clearance from any body leaving in India ? It seems we asked American Citizenship from Indian Government , so crazy! while they are not able to stop Mallya and Nirav Modi who flew after scams !!

After applying for GEP application we already start getting TSA pre check, we wrote to US Home land Security they replied that they already clear the back round check here in United States but waiting for Indian Government recommendations. I think after their back round check in US they start giving us Tse Pe Check since last three four months.

How is FOIAing DHS/CPB or DoS is even relevant here? Indian govt is within its full right to choose how to vet it's citizen as part of bilateral diplomatic agreement. I'm sure US govt. would appreciate (read - must have asked) for full vetting at highest standard to ensure this benefit is only extended to who are in fact low risk travelers. But, they can't dictate Indian govt (or any other sovereign nation) on procedural implementation on how to achieve that. For example, GE for UK citizens are totally controlled by UK govt for initial vetting even before one can start any paperwork with CBP.

Conversation has gotten mixed-up on diplomacy vs implementation. This is a unilateral benefit offered by US govt to Indian citizen which was only possible through a bilateral discussion. There is no reciprocity here for US citizens. Now, it's totally different story that Indian govt. botched the ground level implementation may be in the favor of political stunts since the announcement coincides with Modi's US visit last year. Benefit is still to reach to many Indian citizens even when they applied within days of announcement.

So, isn't it as simple as to say that "it was a diplomatic success for India but implementation failure (so far)"?

Using the number does not facilitate a positive PreCheck outcome until after final approval by CBP.

I'm sure you are privy to more information that I do so that's why you see USG role in this fiasco. I just don't. For me, it's simple Indian machinery failure. There are no public info of the bargaining chip for GOI when USG extended the unilateral benefit to Indian citizens which is not even available to many countries under VWP.

USG has already extended ACP to B1/B2 on some ports. They can easily choose to extended to other visa classes as well. How they choose to protect their border is purely their business.

MEA is used to of running retail like operations and that part has been handled well for most part. But, Finance/Home Ministry are not. So, this is result of simple overnight burden on them which I think is still in figuring out phase.

Again, we can always agree to disagree

USG Failure - They promised refunds for those that applied within first few days before they updated site. I asked for a refund after it was clear that a visit to India was required. My application was eventually cancelled in December. Still no refund. Every email response comes back asking for the same information again and again.

I was in India in December so I re-applied for GE and got my PSK stuff done. Initial app refund is still pending (both fees were rebated by credit cards, so not an issue). Both USG and GOI have handled this very poorly.

It would have qualified for "Buyer Protection" policy on most credit cards. A simple dispute would have done it. Question is - how far would you go to claim zero-sum dollar? or, may be how far one is willing to help their bank to recover money spent by them on one's behalf? or, if feeling lucky then, CFPB (again USG) complain might do the trick.

So, is it a govt. failure (irrespective of the country) or just lack of dutiful exercise of available consumer rights?

A FOIA enquiry with the DHS will most certainly yield some info on what kind of background check the US Govt expected and can be contrasted to the the super high level being implemented by the GoI.