Registration of Foreign Nationals Visiting India

Foreigners’ Registration

The Indian government requires foreigners traveling on certain visas to register shortly after their arrival. This does not apply to visas holders of Tourist Visas or other shot- term visa. If you are in India on a long-term Student Visa, Research Visa, Employment Visa, Medical Visa, Medical Attendant Visa or Missionary Visa, you have to register in person within 14 days of your first arrival at the nearest Foreigner’s Registration Office (FRO) or Foreigner’s Regional Registration Office (FRRO), no matter how long you plan to stay. In small towns, the office of the Superintendent of Police or the LIU (Local Intelligence Unit) is the FRO. For other types of long-term visas, including Business and Entry Visas, you don’t need to register if your stay is not more than 180 days on a single visit. If your plans change, be sure to register well before the end of the 180 days.

You only have to register once during the validity of the visa, even if you take trips out of India. You will only have to register again if you enter India on a new visa or if you move to a new district. However, you must inform the FRO whenever you move or if you leave the district for more than a few weeks (be sure to ask for the current requirements when you register). They may check periodically to see if you are residing at your registered address.

For registration, you need your passport, a photocopy of your passport and visa, four recent passport-size photos, proof of address, photocopies of your appointment letter and all the documents you had to provide to get your visa, including pass-port and visa. Take four or five copies of everything in case they ask for them, which they often do. If you are a year and are between the staying more than ages of 15 and 60, you will also need an AIDS test certificate (be sure to keep a copy).

If you are staying in a hotel because you haven’t found your own place yet, you can bring a notarized letter on their letterhead as your proof of address. If you’re staying with friends, you’ll need a notarized letter photocopy of their identity card and proof of address, and maybe a photo as well.

Call ahead to make sure the office is open. They close for o lunch and possible holidays. Getting registered is an intensely bureaucratic exercise that often requires more than one trip to the office, so don’t wait until the last day. Go early, and bring something to do while you wait, as you can expect to be there for a few hours, especially if you are in a big city.

There is no fee for foreigner’s registration, but there is a penalty for late registration. Failing to register altogether when required brings much harsher penalties. Children under the age of 16 years don’t have to register.

After you have registered, add a good color photocopy of your registration certificate to your document portfolio. It’s good to carry a copy with you, too.

 Getting Your Bearings

No matter how well you have prepared yourself, some degree of culture shock is unavoidable.  There will inevitably be many things you haven’t anticipated, and at times it may be a real stretch to accept them.

If you are feeling overwhelmed by the foreignness and immensity of India, try approaching the culture in small steps. Especially if you are staying for a while, start by making friends with one or two of the local people. Indians are typically warm and approachable people who easily respond to overtures of friendship, and they are usually happy to help you make sense of your new environment. By making friends with local people, you will also find your world expanding and getting richer. If you start including your new Indian friends in social gatherings or outings and accepting their invitations, life can quickly become much more interesting. India’s cultural diversity is extremely rich, but if you spend all your time with people of your own culture, you could come away without having ever experienced India. On the other hand, by getting to know and really enjoy the country and its people, you can have fabulous memories to treasure for a lifetime.

If you are living on your own in India and you feel a desperate need to be with people from your own country, go to your embassy or consulate and ask about social programs or clubs. You can also try to strike up some friendships with the people

Who work there? Most of the big cities have expat clubs that you can join. However, while it is natural to seek the company of other people from one’s own culture, and most people need to do so fairly often, try not to spend all of your free time with them. Some big international organizations have created a thoroughly un-Indian environment for their employees, and some people, being put off or intimidated by the extreme foreignness of India, are inclined to remain in the comfort zone of that more familiar culture and don’t interact much with the local people.

As a result, their experience of India is inevitably a shallow one, which can only lead to a superficial and distorted impression of India.

If you are stressed out from your work or anything else, instead of getting drunk, smoking a joint, or doing whatever you can to blot the situation from your awareness, consider taking up meditation to calm your mind, and then do it regularly. Anyone can meditate. If you can think a thought, you can do it. I learned Transcendental Meditation3 while in college. At the time I was so stressed out that I was all but suicidal, and my mind was so noisy I could hardly think straight. However, once I started meditating, my life began to change: the noise died down, and I became less and less frantic, less and less stressed out. My grades improved, as did my health and social relations. If I could meditate in such a state, anyone can. Don’t think you don’t have time to meditate. If you are more relaxed, you will find that you can work much more efficiently. I’ve been meditating twice a day for decades, and it still keeps getting better.

What you focus your attention on grows stronger in your life. If you focus on your misery, you will inevitably become more and more miserable. Don t sit around feeling sorry for yourself, thinking all the time about how lonely and isolated you feel or you will inevitably continue to feel like that. If you focus on what you lack, lack is what you will have. Instead, look around and surroundings, for all the positive things you can find in and do your circumstances definitely feel better.

If you living in India with your family, try to spend plenty of time together doing fun and interesting things. Expand your interests: take up yoga; learn the local language; volunteer to help at an orphanage; join a local sports team; the possibilities are endless. Rather than always seeking out expat activities, go for local fairs, sporting events, nearby parks, etc.

To get to know a place, spend some time walking around slowly and aimlessly, just exploring, stopping to talk to people, making friends, asking a lot of questions if language is not a barrier, using sign language if it is. Keep your eyes and ears o take the back roads and alleys, pen, avoiding the tourist places, and you’ll be richly rewarded for your efforts. This is one of the best ways to get in tune with India.

Sticking to a rigid agenda or always being in a hurry results in a lot of frustration. If you aren’t relaxed and flexible, it always happens that just when you have met someone or spotted something really interesting, it’s time to leave. India doesn’t open itself up to people dashing around the country on an “if today is Monday, this must be Ajanta” kind of itinerary. The hidden treasures of India only reveal themselves to those who move slowly.

For more information on Registration of Foreign Nationals Visiting India and Holiday Packages in India contact Swan Tours one of the leading travel agents in India.