NEW DELHI, March 2 – India’s Tourism Ministry has proposed extending the visa-on-arrival (VOA) facility to tourists of 16 more countries, including Malaysia.
The facility is currently available to 11 countries, namely Cambodia, Finland, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Luxembourg, Myanmar, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam.
The tourist VOA, which is being granted by immigration Officers at the New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata airports, has a maximum validity of 30 days with a single-entry facility.
The ministry strongly feels that the tourist VOA facility for those countries which are potential source markets for India and where there have been no security-related issues in the past or likely to be in the future can be taken up under this scheme, Minister K. Chiranjeevi (pic) said.
He has submitted the proposal to Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde.
The other potential countries besides Malaysia are Brazil, Brunei, France, Germany, Kazakhstan, Norway, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, Trinidad & Tobago, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.
The Ministry of Tourism has also proposed extending the tourist VOA facility to more airports, namely Bodhgaya, Bengaluru, Goa, Hyderabad, Kochi, and Thiruvananthapuram.
— BERNAMA
