In looking at what BLS is asking for - i can very well agree with them. your case is unique because you are canadian, your wife is indian - no problems so far, however, your wife is not present with you in your country of residense - every immigration authority wants to make sure it is not a marriage of convinience - which is why they are requesting these additional documentation from you.
1. the technical term for what they are asking in your question 1 is "authentication and appostilation" you can authenticate your marriage certificate from the state government where your marriage was regiestered and the certificate issued. for example, if you married in maharastra, you will need to go to the state secretariat of maharastra and request that your marriage certificate be "authenticated". they will ask you to fill in some sort of form, and attach copies of your marriage certificate along with your original. they will then send a copy of the marriage certifcate to the place where it was issued - for example to the office of the marriage registrar pune - if you were married and certificate issued in pune. the concerned office will recieve the letter from the secretariat and they will pull up their records and validate it and respond back to the state department that it is genuine and that they issued it. once the secretariat recieves this confirmation, they will stamp the original marriage certificate in the back and state that it is authentic, sign it and return back to you. that completes portion 1.
after that is done, you will need to appostile, however to do this you have to go to MEA through their authorised brokers. this is actually the most easy part, however MEA will not appostile if it is not authenticated. so authentication is a pre-requisite.
if you have the certificate authenitcated, you have one more option if you do not want to appostile. you can produce a joint affidavit and submit it along with the authenticated marriage certificate. this is documented in the instructions as well - please have a look.
2. along with the OCI application, they will take the original indian passport - even if surrendered of you and your spouse (if you are married). the reason they are asking for notarised passport copy of your spouse is because - your wife is not in canada, so you cannot submit the original passport. in absense of this they want a copy of your spouses passport, notarised. i would suggest this - have your wife take copies of ALL pages of her passport, even if the page is blank, get the copies notarised in india, and snail mail you the notarised papers, submit those original notarised papers with your application. do not ask her to post you her original passport.
3. same with affidavit. write a simple letter, which is to be addressed to the authorities by your wife and signed by her. once that is done, notarise that document and have her snail mail to you, and submit it with your application.
i dont think this is possible within june 2016. would suggest strongly that do not apply from india, it will take even longer and with more uncertanities. it is much more streamlined while you are here. the good news however is that since you are going to india, you can complete all these formalities such as authenication, notarising documents etc. and when you return back apply for your OCI from here. for me to get the documnent authenticated, it took about 3 months - its a slow process and needs constant follow up. for you the advantage is that since you will be there in india you can get all these done.
get a entry visa and go to india. if you are leaving by 30th you should apply for the VISA ASAP if you do not have already.
hope this helps, if more questions - shoot.
cecapplied
nubee said:
I went in today morning to submit OCI app.
Everything looked fine till we reached marriage documents section. I recently got married and spouse is still in India. I had attached marriage certificate from State Govt. But BLS asked to provide the following documents:
1. Marriage certificate notarized from the Ministry of External Affairs, India
2. Wife's passport notarized from a notary in India
3. A no-objection affidavit from wife regarding my OCI application, notarized from a notary in India
I got PR thru skilled worker program and wife has not sponsored me. My wife hasn't got her PR yet.
I am really looking for help on this. Did anyone face similar situation? Please share your advice.
I plan to visit India at the earliest for long-term (4-6 months) for family reasons. I need to be home by June 30, 2016. Not sure if I should rather apply in India.
Thanks so much in advance for your help,
