The government is all set to simplify visa application forms to bring them at par with global standards, a senior government official told The Hindu .
The travel and tourism industry has been seeking the government’s intervention to achieve pre-COVID era foreign tourist footfall, a target which India has not been able to meet yet. “The visa forms will be made simpler and user-friendly in the coming days. Foreign tourist arrival in 2019, before the 2020 COVID pandemic, stood at 1.093 crore, while in 2025, the number of foreign tourists was 91.5 lakh, according to the Ministry of Tourism data. In 2024, around 99 lakh foreign tourists arrived in India and in 2023, the number was 95 lakh tourists. The changes will reflect in all the 22 visa categories, in accordance with global standards. The forms will be leaner and the number of fields will be reduced by approximately 70%,” said the official. A tourism industry official, who did not wish to be identified, said they had urged the government to uniformly apply the 120-day application window to all countries.
Another official said the visa forms were being designed in a way to remove repetitive fields. The industry official said the tourism sector had also requested the government to allow e-visas for Chinese travellers.
Redundant fields in the bulky visa forms would be done away with and the changes were likely to be implemented from next year, the official said.
