Indian Americans not in favour for passport surrender rules

By siliconindia   |   Monday, 11 April 2011, 23:56 IST   |    3 Comments
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Bangalore:Lately, due to the imposition of the passport surrendering rules by the Indian government and their delay in issuing visa to visit India, has disturbed the Indian Americans with unfavorable behavior by them. Due to the misuse of passports by few natural Indian citizens in other countries, this issue has come into light resulting the surrendering of old passports by the Indian Americans. One million people occupy the USA, as naturalized original Indian citizens. These rules came into light when the Indian Embassies/high commissions began charging an additional fee of $200 for consular service and $175 fee for surrendering the old Indian passport. Indian American families with four members had to pay penalties to passport surrendering for Indian entry visa or overseas Indian Citizenship (OCI). As a result, other naturalized Indians in countries like the UK, Canada and other European countries are facing similar problems with Indian community in their respective countries, according to Global Organization of People of Indian Origin (GOPIO). The unhappy community had an MOU initiated by the GOPIO addressing it to the Prime Minister of India resulting in the reduction of the penalty fee by $20. Considerably, the Indian missions in European countries are not able to adapt to these sudden changes of rules as they lack the working staff for the additional passport work. Eventually, the streets of Manhattan were bustling with Indian Citizens for the surrendering of their passports, as a result the U.S. authorities decided to carry the procedure online.