How and Who Can Apply for Indian Visa?

In order to enter Indian territory, foreign nationals are required to obtain a valid Indian visa from an Indian diplomatic mission. The visitors to India are required to have the possession of an international travel document in the form of a national passport along with Indian visa. However, prior to that, applicants must understand the procedure to obtain an Indian visa and the eligibility to be able to obtain it. Earlier the procedure was daunting and lengthy therefore the government of India has introduced several amendments in the Indian visa law making it easy for the people living in foreign countries to apply for Indian visa online or offline without much hassle and delay.

Talking about eligibility, citizens of two nationalities i.e. Nepal and Bhutan are not required to obtain Indian visa at all due to some bilateral agreement between the governments. Foreigners except for citizens of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, mainland China, Nepal, and Pakistan, with the possession of an Overseas Citizen of India Certificate or Person of Indian Origin Card are given the rights of domicile in India and allowed to make multiple entries and exits through India without obtaining an Indian visa. In fact, citizens of Maldives are also allowed to stay in India for not more than ninety days without the possession of Indian passport as per the agreement between governments.

Indian government extends the Indian e-visa service to the citizens of over 160 nationalities and continuously working on bringing more nations under its radar. Once issued, a regular Indian visa stands valid for one year more as per the discretion of the consulate and an e-visa is valid for not more than sixty days. To begin with the application procedure, applicants need to collect necessary documents and submit them along with the application form electronically. The applicants are advised to make the fee payment at least four days prior to the date of arrival in case of an e-visa and four days prior to the date of issue in case of a regular visa. They also should keep this in mind that more than three unsuccessful attempts of fee payments can block their application forcing them to start from the scratch again.

Once the payment is made, an auto-generated application ID will be sent to the applicants which they should keep safe with them for further communication. A general Indian visa processing time period extends from three to five working days depending upon the nationalities and excluding special cases. Applicants should know that to visit protected areas in India they are required to have the holding of a Protected Area Permit (PAP) along with the visa. They can obtain PAP while on the tour but before entering the protected area.

Be aware of unscrupulous commercial websites pretending to assist foreigners to apply for an Indian visa in a hassle-free manner. Also, there are some websites that appear just like the government of India's official website and must not be mistaken as the actual Indian visa application platform.

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visaonline08 Joined: May 2nd, 2019