Currently, 7.1% of the total traffic is inbound tourism . The Federation of Associations in Indian Tourism & Hospitality (FAITH), representing tourism, travel, and hospitality industry bodies, said it hopes this would increase to 15.9% by 2035.

India has a wealth of tourism attractions, destinations and niche markets. The country heavily promotes at international events and trade shows and has a good base of SMEs and some major tour operators providing inbound travel services to this billion+ people nation.

An Indian e-Visa can be granted to passport-holders in 163 nations whose sole objective of visiting India is recreation, sight seeing, casual visit to meet friends or relatives, attending a short term yoga program, medical treatment including treatment under Indian systems of medicine and business purpose.

It sounds easy enough to apply for a visa online. The cost for a 30 day visa is between $10- $25, one year $40.00 and five years $80.00

This fee can be paid by credit card during this online process.

Sounds easy, but it is confusing and bureaucratic for many, specially in western country where citizens are used to travel and have easy access.

An U.S. travel professional just applied for a 5 year visa and was turned down the first time having to submit the application a second time and a visa was issued.

There was no refund of the $80.00 paid, so the price on the visa doubled to $160.00.

India is learning from other countries, such as the United States or the UK where applicants get frequently rejected at will, and don’t get their money back.

The Indian form however is confusing to say the least.

Why are visitors expected to know a person in India when touring the country. One of the requirement is to name a person in India as a reference.

It appears hotel managers often are willing to take this task and vouch for guests he or she never saw before. It really cannot be an issue out security precaution.

One of the questions are to list the countries one had traveled in the last 10 years.

In the case of the US travel professional, he traveled to more than 70 countries in the last 10 years.

You can put a gun on my chest and I would not be able to list all the countries I traveled to.
US traveler applying for an Indian visa.

After he went through this effort and listed 49 countries, the form was rejected explaining it can only hold 10 countries in the response.

Words used in the form may be unfamiliar to many. One question was if one specifically traveled to countries belonging to a three letter code. Hard to guess what this is.

Another question referred to names of parents and grandparents and to all their citizenship they had. As a 65 year old traveler this may be a difficult question to respond to for some.

Uploading a photo following the exact requirement is easy for someone who works on Adobe Photoshop every day, but impossible for someone who uses a computer mostly for entertainment or email.

Scanning and uploading the passport photo is a little more flexible, but also has strict limitation on the form.

Paying the fee on a credit card and submitting the form was relatively easy, but there was an unexpected response by the Indian authorities.

Regardless how complete the response was the applicant should expect an email from the Home Department in India with more question.

Such questions refer to who a travel partner is or more details on the person one used as a reference.

The real problem is, one has 12 hours to respond to the email from the Home Office in India to avoid rejection.

If the email arrives at 10 pm and you don’t check your emails before 10 am, you are out of luck.

If the email was overlooked and/or not responded to within the 12 hour limit the visa is automatically rejected. It means the fee paid is lost and another application needs to be started. Finally one need to pay the fee for a second time.

The visa is not available on land boarders, and only at the following Indian airports.

(1) Delhi (2) Mumbai (3) Chennai (4) Kolkata (5) Trivandrum (6) Bangalore (7) Hyderabad (8) Cochin (9) Goa (10) Ahmedabad (11) Amritsar (12) Gaya (13) Jaipur (14) Lucknow (15) Trichy (16) Varanasi (17) Calicut (18) Mangalore (19) Pune (20) Nagpur (21) Coimbatore (22) Bagdogra (23) Guwahati , (24) Chandigarh and (25) Visakhapatnam.

Citizens from 163 countries can apply for the Indian e-visa:

1. Andorra 2. Angola 3. Anguilla 4. Antigua & Barbuda 5. Albania 6. Austria 7. Argentina 8. Armenia 9. Aruba 10. Australia 11. Azerbaijan 12. Bahamas 13. Barbados 14. Belgium 15. Belize 16. Bolivia 17. Bosnia & Herzegovina 18. Botswana 19. Brazil 20. Brunei 21. Bulgaria 22. Burundi 23. Cambodia 24. Cameron Union Republic 25. Canada 26. Cape Verde 27. Cayman Island 28. Chile 29. China 30. China- SAR Hongkong 31. China- SAR Macau 32. Colombia 33. Comoros 34. Cook Islands 35. Costa Rica 36. Cote d’lvoire 37. Croatia List of countries whose nationals are eligible for e- Visa facility 40 38. Cuba 39. Cyprus 40. Czech Republic 41. Denmark 42. Djibouti 43. Dominica 44. Dominican Republic 45. East Timor 46. Ecuador 47. El Salvador 48. Estonia 49. Eritrea 50. Fiji 51. Finland 52. France 53. Gabon 54. Gambia 55. Georgia 56. Germany 57. Ghana 58. Greece 59. Grenada 60. Guatemala 61. Guinea 62. Guyana 63. Haiti 64. Honduras 65. Hungary 66. Iceland 67. Indonesia 68. Ireland 69. Israel 70. Italy 71. Jamaica 72. Japan 73. Jordan 74. Kenya 75. Kiribati 76. Laos 77. Latvia 78. Lesotho 79. Liberia 80. Liechtenstein 81. Lithuania 82. Luxembourg 83. Macedonia 84. Madagascar 41 85. Malaysia 86. Malawi 87. Mali 88. Malta 89. Marshall Islands 90. Mauritius 91. Mexico 92. Micronesia 93. Moldova 94. Monaco 95. Mongolia 96. Montenegro 97. Montserrat 98. Mozambique 99. Myanmar 100. Namibia 101. Nauru 102. Netherlands 103. New Zealand 104. Nicaragua 105. Niger Republic 106. Niue Island 107. Norway 108. Oman 109. Palau 110. Palestine 111. Panama 112. Papua New Guinea 113. Paraguay 114. Peru 115. Philippines 116. Poland 117. Portugal 118. Republic of Korea 119. Romania 120. Russia 121. Rwanda 122. Saint Christopher and Nevis 123. Saint Lucia 124. Saint Vincent & the Grenadines 125. San Marino 126. Samoa 127. Senegal 128. Serbia 129. Seychelles 130. Sierra Leone 131. Singapore 132. Slovenia 133. Slovakia 42 134. Solomon Islands 135. South Africa 136. Spain 137. Sri Lanka 138. Suriname 139. Swaziland 140. Switzerland 141. Sweden 142. Taiwan 143. Tanzania 144. Tajikistan 145. Thailand 146. Tonga 147. Trinidad & Tobago 148. Turks & Caicos Island 149. Tuvalu 150. UAE 151. Ukraine 152. United Kingdom(UK) 153. United States of America (USA) 154. Uruguay 155. Uzbekistan 156. Vanuatu 157. Vatican City-Holy See 158. Venezuela 159. Vietnam 160 Zambia 161. Zimbabwe 162. Uganda 163 Kazakhstan

India received 6.19 million Foreign Tourist Arrivals (FTAs) during 2022 as compare to 1.52 million during the same period of 2021. There were 10.93 million Foreign Tourist Arrivals (FTAs) in India during pre-pandemic year 2019. Tourism Industry has shown good signs of revival after Covid-19 pandemic