Visa Required For India

Some information that I hope will be useful to somebody. I am a Canadian living in Metro Vancouver who will be cruising on the Rotterdam in March 2016 and as the ship will be visiting Mumbai I needed an Indian visa. I was told I would not be allowed to embark the ship in Singapore without one. I had read various postings online about some people's tribulations and delays in getting one, but in the end I found it to be a quite straightforward process. Note that eVisas are only (in Jan 2016) for people arriving at a named international airport. Passengers arriving on cruise ships must have a regular visa (whether they plan to get off the ship or not). The Consulate General of India website http://www.cgivancouver.org/pages.php?id=27 spells out the steps involved. They have farmed out the processing, checking and submitting of the application forms and paperwork to BLS International Services Canada Inc. http://www.blsindia-canada.com

I started by completing online and printing out the visa application form at https://indianvisaonline.gov.in/visa/. I chose to take it in person to the BLS office in downtown Vancouver to get some direct personal service, but I could have mailed it in or submitted it online. The staff in the BLS office were helpful and assisted me in getting all details correct and acceptable in one visit (after a one hour wait). I paid them $15 to take my photo of the size and aspect they required.

A lot of personal information is required on the application form and the one area that seems to throw some people for a loop is the Indian reference. I put down 'MS ROTTERDAM (CRUISE SHIP) with the address "MUMBAI CRUISE SHIP TERMINAL' with phone '022-081-1181047' (found on the internet). The officer reviewing my application accepted this but would have liked a copy of my cruise booking which I did not yet have. She settled for a copy of the cruise itinerary which she found online, printed out for me and attached to my application. She also, even though I would only be making one entry into India, changed my application from Single Entry to Multiple Entry. I don't know why, but I don't think it cost any more.

Since the visa time clock starts ticking the day it is stuck into your passport, make sure your visa will not expire until long after you have left India! I got a 6 month visa 2 months before my arrival in Mumbai for a one-day visit!

I picked up my passport with included visa from the BLS office one week after I dropped it off with my application. I paid $106.50 Cdn (cash or debit only), which included $15 for the photo. It also included a $20 "optional" courier fee which they insisted I pay even though I told them I would be picking up my passport at their office and did not want it couriered to my home. I consider this a rip-off by BLS, which marred their otherwise excellent service.

This was my experience in Vancouver. If you live elsewhere your mileage may vary?

Similar process in the UK. We completed the online form using the link on the Indian High Commission web-site, printed it off, attached a copy of our Azamara invoice and a copy of the itinerary, paid on line and posted the form and our passports to the address mentioned on the website. You can't post it to any Indian Commission address, they have a place in Middlesex that does the processing. We bought the Post Office secure envelopes to post it off and paid the extra to have the passports returned securely. We got texts every day or two telling us of progress and they were back with us a week after posting.

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Similar process in the UK. We completed the online form using the link on the Indian High Commission web-site, printed it off, attached a copy of our Azamara invoice and a copy of the itinerary, paid on line and posted the form and our passports to the address mentioned on the website. You can't post it to any Indian Commission address, they have a place in Middlesex that does the processing. We bought the Post Office secure envelopes to post it off and paid the extra to have the passports returned securely. We got texts every day or two telling us of progress and they were back with us a week after posting.

 

 

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That was our experience also - one of the more efficient visa processes we have encountered. We have a face to face office in Edinburgh but no way would I use that. Any horror stories I come across are people who felt unable to trust the centralised Middlesex address and tried to deliver and collect paperwork themselves from an Indian commission office in the UK

In this instance remote postal is way way better.

Similar process in the UK. We completed the online form using the link on the Indian High Commission web-site, printed it off, attached a copy of our Azamara invoice and a copy of the itinerary, paid on line and posted the form and our passports to the address mentioned on the website. You can't post it to any Indian Commission address, they have a place in Middlesex that does the processing. We bought the Post Office secure envelopes to post it off and paid the extra to have the passports returned securely. We got texts every day or two telling us of progress and they were back with us a week after posting.

 

 

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That was my experience too. Very efficient and back within a week. The instructions were a bit onerous to read as they seemed to be spread out in different areas of the website, but get it all right and it's fine. Highly recommend paying a little extra to get the notifications.

Phil

Hi how long do you need to apply for your indian:) visa before the cruise

Hi how long do you need to apply for your indian:) visa before the cruise

Indian visas are valid from the date of issue and not the date of travel so for this reason you can't apply too early. They say it normally takes minimum two weeks to process, but see my post above. It was very quick. However out of choice I'd want to give myself more time than that. A month or six weeks would seem sensible. Postal applications are all sent to London. Make sure you read the website carefully to make sure you are submitting the right documents. There are a plethora of agencies who will do all the legwork for you and check the application, but it's expensive and providing you read the instructions it's easy to do yourself.

Phil

Yes, please make sure that you allow plenty of time for your visa application. Our [brand new] passport got "lost" in the post when we sent off our applications. We had to cancel them and purchase new before we could apply again. The passports eventually turned up weeks later.

Incidentally, that stress and expense of the above was enough. However, we had applied for our ESTA between receiving the new passports and sending off for our India visas. We, therefore, had to apply for new ESTAs and the issues and associated stress this caused for two years was even greater!

Best of luck!

Some information that I hope will be useful to somebody. I am a Canadian living in Metro Vancouver who will be cruising on the Rotterdam in March 2016 and as the ship will be visiting Mumbai I needed an Indian visa. I was told I would not be allowed to embark the ship in Singapore without one. I had read various postings online about some people's tribulations and delays in getting one, but in the end I found it to be a quite straightforward process. Note that eVisas are only (in Jan 2016) for people arriving at a named international airport. Passengers arriving on cruise ships must have a regular visa (whether they plan to get off the ship or not). The Consulate General of India website http://www.cgivancouver.org/pages.php?id=27 spells out the steps involved. They have farmed out the processing, checking and submitting of the application forms and paperwork to BLS International Services Canada Inc. http://www.blsindia-canada.com

 

I started by completing online and printing out the visa application form at https://indianvisaonline.gov.in/visa/. I chose to take it in person to the BLS office in downtown Vancouver to get some direct personal service, but I could have mailed it in or submitted it online. The staff in the BLS office were helpful and assisted me in getting all details correct and acceptable in one visit (after a one hour wait). I paid them $15 to take my photo of the size and aspect they required.

 

A lot of personal information is required on the application form and the one area that seems to throw some people for a loop is the Indian reference. I put down 'MS ROTTERDAM (CRUISE SHIP) with the address "MUMBAI CRUISE SHIP TERMINAL' with phone '022-081-1181047' (found on the internet). The officer reviewing my application accepted this but would have liked a copy of my cruise booking which I did not yet have. She settled for a copy of the cruise itinerary which she found online, printed out for me and attached to my application. She also, even though I would only be making one entry into India, changed my application from Single Entry to Multiple Entry. I don't know why, but I don't think it cost any more.

 

Since the visa time clock starts ticking the day it is stuck into your passport, make sure your visa will not expire until long after you have left India! I got a 6 month visa 2 months before my arrival in Mumbai for a one-day visit!

 

I picked up my passport with included visa from the BLS office one week after I dropped it off with my application. I paid $106.50 Cdn (cash or debit only), which included $15 for the photo. It also included a $20 "optional" courier fee which they insisted I pay even though I told them I would be picking up my passport at their office and did not want it couriered to my home. I consider this a rip-off by BLS, which marred their otherwise excellent service.

 

This was my experience in Vancouver. If you live elsewhere your mileage may vary?

We are Canadians living in the USA, travelling to India next month. Here is our experience from a couple of months ago.

We applied via the online visa process. Our application was "interesting".

Going to page (or widget) 2 the application showed my wife's spouses' employer (this is not a typo) as our address in India.

3 days and several phone calls later we started again. This time our permanent address was the address of our US reference.

After 3 more days and several more phone calls we started again. I forget the reason, but the info on widget 2 was again incorrect.

On the 4th attempt we actually got as far as the payment page. It wouldn't accept payment - the web site got hung up. (Remember, this is an application for one of us - an application for traveler #2 is also required).

At this point we surrendered and paid almost $100 or so each for a visa service. 7 days later our passports were returned, with 10 year visas. I think 10 year visas are the only option for Canadians living in the US. The visa cost was US$150 or so each.

A few days later a friend advised us that the US India Visa site was canvassing for complaints about the US website - which is administered by a private co.

At this point we had spent far too much time on our Indian Visas, so we didn't respond.

We're now actively seeking trips to India to take advantage of our 10 year visa!!

Similar process in the UK. We completed the online form using the link on the Indian High Commission web-site, printed it off, attached a copy of our Azamara invoice and a copy of the itinerary, paid on line and posted the form and our passports to the address mentioned on the website. You can't post it to any Indian Commission address, they have a place in Middlesex that does the processing. We bought the Post Office secure envelopes to post it off and paid the extra to have the passports returned securely. We got texts every day or two telling us of progress and they were back with us a week after posting.

 

 

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Hi grandma cruising, we are travelling by cruise with our children from Abu Dhabi to India and visiting various ports, could you help how I find the link via the commission site as we are not arriving to an airport only a port in India.

Thanks Jane