IN A BID to attract more foreign tourists, the Indian government has decided to provide collective landing permits.
The revised procedure will allow foreign tourists in groups of four or more arriving by air or sea and sponsored by tourism ministry-approved, Indian travel agencies to be given a collective landing permit. The tourists should have a pre-drawn itinerary; the permit will not exceed a period of 60 days.
Such tourists will get multiple entry facilities to enable them to visit neighbouring countries.
In order to avail this facility, the tourists or travel agencies will have to make an online application. The tourists or travel agencies also need to submit a complete list of members along with a printed visa application and their itinerary to the Foreigner’s Regional Registration Office or Foreigner’s Registration office (FRO) at cities such as Kolkata, Delhi, Amritsar and Lucknow in the north.
Southern cities such as Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kochi, Thiruvananthapuram, Calicut and
western cities of Mumbai and Goa also have FROs.
The tourists or travel agencies also need to give an undertaking to conduct the group as per the itinerary and
give assurance that no individual would be allowed to drop out from the group at any place.
The Ministry of Home Affairs is working on simplifying visa procedures, with the progress being monitored by the Prime Minister’s Office.
India’s Tourism Minister K Chiranjeevi had recently met Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde to discuss the proposed procedures.
Chiranjeevi welcomed the new initiative.
“This is a move forward and would go a long way towards boosting group travel to India. It will also give a fillip to the tourism industry in the country,” he said.
