Niti Aayog proposes to increase e-Visa validity to 10 years

The Indian Government had launched the e-Visa services in November 2014 to make the process of obtaining visa less cumbersome and increase its reach.

However, even with the introduction of the facility, according to the ‘The Strategy for New India @ 75’ report by Niti Aayog, the people find it difficult to go through the visa procurement process.

Henceforth, to promote its product e-Visa, Niti Aayog has propositioned to increase the validity of these visas to 10 years. It further proposed to also enhance the number of annual visits allowed people having an e-Medical visa.

As per the think tank’s belief these developments are bound to increase the number of tourist visits for the country.

Currently, the validity form the date of arrival in India, for e-Visa is 60 days, e-Conference if 30 days. Annual visits allowed to e-Business and e-Tourist visa is two, and e-Medical and e-Medical Attendant visa is three. For e-Conference visa, only single entry is allowed.

Overall, and e-Visa can only be availed maximum three times in a calendar year.

The increase in the duration of e-Visa validity, along with steps like launching awareness enhancing information campaigns through consulate board and e-Visa regime, is supposed to attract clientele from meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions (MICE) market among other visitors.

As far as e-Medical visa is concerned, along with an increase in the number of annual visits to facilitate follow-ups/post-operative care, Niti Aayog has also propositioned to increase the number of attendants allowed from two to four persons under the same visa, taking inspiration from Malaysia.

If these propositions are followed through, apart from other categories like medical, the Indian Startup ecosystem will also be benefitted from the same with the increase in the number of possible conferences, investment meets, the volume of business inflow due to greater accessibility among other things.