India opens 11 more entry points to foreign e-visa holders

• The Ministry of Home Affairs officially notified 11 more entry points — nine land ports, and two airports, allowing e-visa holders to enter India.

• With the addition of these new ports, the total number of international ports where e-visa holders can enter has risen to 88. 

• This includes 37 airports, 38 seaports, and 13 land ports, aimed at making the e-visa facility more accessible and beneficial for international travellers.

• The newly added land ports are Agartala, Darranga, Gede, Ghojadanga, Haridaspur, Jaigaon, Dawki, Moreh, and Attari (Road).

• The newly added airports are Bhopal and Tirupati.

What is e-visa facility?

• The government has taken a number of initiatives over the last few years to liberalise, streamline and simplify visa regime with a view to facilitate the legitimate foreign travelers while simultaneously ramping up the technological infrastructure to enhance internal security. 

• One significant step taken to liberalise and simplify the Indian visa regime, especially the tourist visa regime, is the introduction of the e-visa facility. 

• This facility, with Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA), which was introduced in November 2014.

• It now serves nationals from 172 countries.

• Processing of e-visa is totally on the online platform. A foreigner can apply for e-visa from anywhere. 

• Introduction of e-visa has helped in providing hassle-free entry to foreigners into India for legitimate purposes like tourism, business and medical purposes, etc. 

• The e-visa facility is currently available to 17 sub-categories of travellers, including medical, student, mountaineering, cruise, tourist, transit, group travel and business, among others.

• The addition of these 11 international ports further increases the appeal and utility of the electronic visa, which constitutes 78 per cent of the total visas issued by India.

(The author is a trainer for Civil Services aspirants.)