In a bid to relax travel restrictions for foreigners into the country the Indian government has decided to grant fresh tourist visas from October, the Ministry of Home Affairs said in a statement on Thursday.
In the wake of pandemic outbreak, the government had suspended issuing tourist visas since last year.
Foreign tourists coming into India on charter flights will be given fresh tourists visas by the government from October 15, the statement said.
Foreign tourists travelling to India by flights other than chartered aircraft would be able to do so with effect from November 15, it added.
“After considering the evolving COVID-19 situation, foreigners were later on allowed to avail any kind of Indian visa other than Tourist Visa for entry and stay in India,” the statement highlighted.
The number or fresh infection cases due to covid-19 are on a wane in the country with vaccination rates picking up in last few months.
Dipak Deva, Managing Director, Travel Corporation of India said, “We heartily welcome the government’s announcement on the restart of tourist visa for international guests. This coupled with the earlier announcement of free visas for the first 5 Lakh inbound tourists, is a critical move that will give fillip and accelerate a much needed revival of inbound tourism – a sector that plays a critical role, with over 9% contribution to India’s GDP and USD 30 billion in net foreign exchange receipts; equally a force multiplier in terms of employment generation and skill development across allied sectors.”
The government has recently relaxed few restrictions on domestic commercial flights like increasing capacity cap of airlines to 85%, which means that airlines are from last month allowed to operate upto 85% of their pre covid capacity, up from 72.5% in August.
International flight operations to and from India however, are limited as flights under bilateral air bubble agreements remain restricted to about 28 countries.