how to retrieve undelivered passport?

Last year, my dad applied for my passport online, and I went through all the police verification, personal interview.. but my dad forgot to include sector-xx in the address on one of the forms, resulting in the passport being undelivered. He attempted contacting the post office, but was unsuccessful. Upon visiting the passport office, they told us that we would need to apply for a new passport again, deposit 2000 rupees again, and repeat the entire process once again because it will be extremely difficult for them to retrieve the lost passport. However, I live in a hostel in another city, so I would have to travel back and forth for police verification, etc., which would be very time consuming. Can I do something else instead of reapplying for the passport? I need a passport because I'm planning to travel next year around November, but if I apply again it'll take me a year again since I won't get frequent leaves at the college to complete all the passport processes.