Applying for Indian Tourist Visa on a Canadian PP, without surrendering Indian PP

[aaroniclee]

Hi all,

I'm looking to travel to India (Mumbai) and UAE (Abu Dhabi) on March 2, 2022. I have a Canadian passport (by naturalization, in 2019) and my previous passport was an Indian passport (now expired). I am currently applying for a tourist visa online for India at the BLS Toronto centre, and the checklist mentioned a surrender certificate required.

Can I still apply for the tourist visa without a surrender certificate? Can I surrender my Indian passport at the same time as applying for the Indian visa? Can I surrender my Indian passport now, and show a receipt while applying for the Indian visa? The surrender certificate timeline is about 8 weeks which means I won't get that in time.

Is there any way to get the Indian tourist visa in this situation?

Thanks in advance.

 

[aaroniclee]

Update: I was able to apply without a surrender certificate. It's not needed for a tourist visa; but they advise you to surrender it as soon as possible.

 

[immigrate2017]

Thins is great news! Thank you for the update. I am in the same boat, and wanted to travel in the next few weeks to India so glad to know this works.
IF you see this, can you also please let me know if you've travelled and how long it took for you to get your tourist visa?

 

[aaroniclee]

Thins is great news! Thank you for the update. I am in the same boat, and wanted to travel in the next few weeks to India so glad to know this works.
IF you see this, can you also please let me know if you've travelled and how long it took for you to get your tourist visa?

Hey yeah I did, here's my timeline. My $0.02, if you're travelling in 3 weeks or more, apply for a Tourist visa. If you're travelling in 3 weeks or less, apply for an Entry Visa (you'll need to surrender your Indian passport for this - and you can do it at the same time as the Entry visa application).

Tourist Visa
Applied: Feb 16
Approved: Mar 2
Status Updated on BLS Website: Mar 3
Received via Purolator: Mar 4

Hope this helps.

 

[immigrate2017]

Hey yeah I did, here's my timeline. My $0.02, if you're travelling in 3 weeks or more, apply for a Tourist visa. If you're travelling in 3 weeks or less, apply for an Entry Visa (you'll need to surrender your Indian passport for this - and you can do it at the same time as the Entry visa application).

Tourist Visa
Applied: Feb 16
Approved: Mar 2
Status Updated on BLS Website: Mar 3
Received via Purolator: Mar 4

Hope this helps.

This is awesome news! Thank you very much for the quick reply. I am travelling in more than 3 weeks, however, I wanted to get some details on how quickly they process our visa applications.

What is the process for tourist visa? If e visa was available for Canadian citizens, that would've been great instead of this.

 

[aaroniclee]

This is awesome news! Thank you very much for the quick reply. I am travelling in more than 3 weeks, however, I wanted to get some details on how quickly they process our visa applications.

What is the process for tourist visa? If e visa was available for Canadian citizens, that would've been great instead of this.

Yeah it's unfortunate they're not allowing e-visas for Canadians, I imagine there's some diplomacy politics involved with that.

All in all it should take you 2-3 weeks to get your tourist visa. Triple check your application, the people at BLS only exist to reject your application (80% of the people who came in were rejected due to marginal errors in their application). They rejected mine too since my last name has an apostrophe and they said it needs to be a 'space' instead. Luckily I got them to give me an email, went to a nearby Starbucks, corrected it and went back after convincing the security guard to let me in.

Bring all the forms and photo they asked for and you should be good. Will cost you about ~$50 for the whole thing including courier (you can opt out if you'd like, it's the default option).

 

[akbardxb]

Yeah it's unfortunate they're not allowing e-visas for Canadians, I imagine there's some diplomacy politics involved with that.

All in all it should take you 2-3 weeks to get your tourist visa. Triple check your application, the people at BLS only exist to reject your application (80% of the people who came in were rejected due to marginal errors in their application). They rejected mine too since my last name has an apostrophe and they said it needs to be a 'space' instead. Luckily I got them to give me an email, went to a nearby Starbucks, corrected it and went back after convincing the security guard to let me in.

Bring all the forms and photo they asked for and you should be good. Will cost you about ~$50 for the whole thing including courier (you can opt out if you'd like, it's the default option).

Is this with or without surrendering your Indian passport? Doesn't the form for Tourist visa ask for Surrender Certificates for people of Indian origin?

 

[aaroniclee]

Is this with or without surrendering your Indian passport? Doesn't the form for Tourist visa ask for Surrender Certificates for people of Indian origin?

This is without surrendering your indian passport (I still have mine). The form asks for a Surrender Certificate but it's not mandatory. When you submit, they'll just tell you that you should surrender it soon or pay a fine, but it's not required to get a Tourist visa (confusing I know, since it says you need it online).

 

[immigrate2017]

Yeah it's unfortunate they're not allowing e-visas for Canadians, I imagine there's some diplomacy politics involved with that.

All in all it should take you 2-3 weeks to get your tourist visa. Triple check your application, the people at BLS only exist to reject your application (80% of the people who came in were rejected due to marginal errors in their application). They rejected mine too since my last name has an apostrophe and they said it needs to be a 'space' instead. Luckily I got them to give me an email, went to a nearby Starbucks, corrected it and went back after convincing the security guard to let me in.

Bring all the forms and photo they asked for and you should be good. Will cost you about ~$50 for the whole thing including courier (you can opt out if you'd like, it's the default option).

Ok great. How long is the tourist visa valid for (like 5 years? 1 year?) Can you stay more than 30 days at a time on a tourist visa?
Have you travelled already on the tourist visa?

 

[aaroniclee]

Ok great. How long is the tourist visa valid for (like 5 years? 1 year?) Can you stay more than 30 days at a time on a tourist visa?
Have you travelled already on the tourist visa?

I got the most restrictive type of visa lol. They gave me a 1 month visa, single entry only. Which means I could only stay for roughly a month and could only enter the country once during that period. I travelled and I'm back now.

 

[immigrate2017]

I got the most restrictive type of visa lol. They gave me a 1 month visa, single entry only. Which means I could only stay for roughly a month and could only enter the country once during that period. I travelled and I'm back now.

Thank you for the quick response, really, it means a lot as I was looking for some answers quickly for some personal reasons.

I am OK with just a one month visa but have you heard if people have gotten more? And I'm assuming this can be done via mail too? We don't have to go there for an in-person appointment right? I understand it'll add 3-4 additional business days to process, and I will make sure my application is error free.

 

[aaroniclee]

Thank you for the quick response, really, it means a lot as I was looking for some answers quickly for some personal reasons.

I am OK with just a one month visa but have you heard if people have gotten more? And I'm assuming this can be done via mail too? We don't have to go there for an in-person appointment right? I understand it'll add 3-4 additional business days to process, and I will make sure my application is error free.

No worries - I know how stressful these applications can be so happy to help.

I'm sure you can get a longer visa duration. In my application I only applied for a month so I got a month (I assumed they would give me more by default). You could list any amount of months you'd like to apply for and you should get it. And yes, you can apply via mail instead but just make sure everything's quite proper with no errors.

 

[immigrate2017]

No worries - I know how stressful these applications can be so happy to help.

I'm sure you can get a longer visa duration. In my application I only applied for a month so I got a month (I assumed they would give me more by default). You could list any amount of months you'd like to apply for and you should get it. And yes, you can apply via mail instead but just make sure everything's quite proper with no errors.

Appreciate your understanding! Would you mind sharing your contact with me or are you available anytime on this forum in case I wanted to reach our for any questions? And how long before your trip did you apply?

 

[aaroniclee]

Appreciate your understanding! Would you mind sharing your contact with me or are you available anytime on this forum in case I wanted to reach our for any questions? And how long before your trip did you apply?

Honestly you should be set with the info I provided here - but message me on this forum if there's any other questions. I applied 3 weeks before flying (and had to change my flights because it didn't come in time). Expect the processing time to take between 3-4 weeks based on caseload.

 

[immigrate2017]

Honestly you should be set with the info I provided here - but message me on this forum if there's any other questions. I applied 3 weeks before flying (and had to change my flights because it didn't come in time). Expect the processing time to take between 3-4 weeks based on caseload.

Thank you for all the info! I will reach out to you here, if necessary. Take care.