11 months stay on 6 month tourist visa?

cwcwdavid

Can someone please confirm that this is possible.

As I understand the rules you get a multiple entry tourist visa which is valid for entries up to 6 months from date of issue. At each entry you get a stamp that allows a 6 month stay. I.e. if a final trip to India starts just before the 6 month validity is up you get to stay until 11+ months from the date you originally got the visa.

e.g.
20 May 2005 get visa, travel to India.
10 Nov 2005 enter India for 2nd/3rd time will get a stamp valid to 10 May 2006.

This is the way I understand what I'm reading but not 100% sure.

Could anyone who's done this please confirm / deny it's possible?

Thanks.

seventies'hippy

Ummmm, I don't see it that way, though you may well be right.

How I read it is that your multiple entry visa is valid for 6months from date of issue, during this time you can go in and out of India as many times as you like but the last time you come out must be by the date your original 6months are up.

Merchant

That's not right. Multiple entry means you can come and go as you please for as long as the visa is valid--in this case, six months. That's your window to make trips in and out of India. Each stamp does not give you six months.

Some visas are single-entry. If you get, say, a special visa to attend an academic conference, you can enter India only once. After you come home and you want to go back to India, you have to apply for a new visa.

The six-month multiple entry tourist visa allows you to travel to India, make a side trip to Sri Lanka, come back to India, visit Nepal for a time, come back to India and fly home from Mumbai. Etc.

Yetijuice

That is my read too. I have always interpreted the ending of a 6 month multiple entry visa for India to be 6 months from the date I got the visa. You should be outside India when the visa expires. If you overstay you would probably have to pay a penalty fee and it might be more difficult to get another visa for India. Plan ahead and consider your alternative futures! I have visited India 21 times and have had over a dozen 6 month multiple entry visas. I have had this conversation before while standing in line at the India Embassy with other visa hopefuls.

kiwi_razz

Agree with all the replies.

Using your example:

Get visa on 20 May 2005, it expires 19 November 2005 no matter when you enter India. If you enter on 10 November then you only have 9 days allowed.

markhyd

i know for sure that a business visa is a 6 month duration, multiple entry cannot lengthen that beyond 6 months from the start date. i'd be astonished if that wasn't the case for tourist visa too.

cwcwdavid

Hmm thanks for all the fast replies. Lots of opinions and not lookng good. My long term planning is staying mostly in Goa and Bangkok with trips to Europe when I really have to. It's clear that getting visas in Europe is an expensive hassle (not trips to my native country and no consulate in town) and I read that in Bangkok (where life is very easy , you pay a travel agent and they do the leg worK for minimal $$) I can expect problems with a second - subsequent visas.

I guess the reason I was understanding the way I am is that this is exactly how Thai visas work (except that you pay extra for each possible entry, a visa is used each time you arrive). You can buy up to 3 at an embassy and they're valid for up to 6 months max but if you enter on the last one on the last day you get a 2 month stamp - and can extend for another month.

So it's not impossible for a country to have these rules. Inclined to believe what I'm reading here (shame) but let me ask two other questions.

1. Anyone who entered later in the validity of their visa, does the entry stamp say when you have to leave or just when you arrived?
I seem to remember the latter which gels with you guys interpretation of the rules. It's a long long time since I was last in India though so not in my passport now.

2. Does anyone know a site (pref. Indian gov/consulate) where the rules are stated clearly?

Merchant

The entry stamps are just that--the date you arrived. They say nothing about how long you can stay. That's what the visa itself is for.

I think part of your confusion is that some countries grant visas on arrival by stamping your passport. The stamp indicates the duration of its validity.

India makes you apply for a visa from a consulate beforehand, complete with forms and photos. Then a computer-generated full-page sticker is placed in your passport.

The visa is also valid starting on the date of issue, not the date you arrive, so you have to coordinate getting it with the timing of your trip. As noted above, if you get your visa 5 months before you arrive in India, you can only stay in the country for a month, and no stamp will extend its validity.

You can check New York's Indian consulate

www.indiacgny.org

for more info, but sometimes this stuff is country-specific. The rules for Americans may be different from those for people from other places. But I have never heard of a scheme you describe applying in India. The stamps are just dates.

Americans can get a ten-year multiple-entry visa. By your logic, I could spend the rest of my life in India by spending three weekends in Dubai. I know that's not the case, else I'd already be doing it. The ten-year visas, by the way, are valid only in six-month increments. You have to leave and come back every six months. That visa won't allow you to stay in India for an uninterrupted decade.

India is pretty rigorous with its visa regulations. Your passport and visa numbers get checked and recorded by law when you check into a hotel, for example. There's no easy way to spend more than six months at a time in India, without a work permit or a marriage license. Remember, visas are immigration documents. If you overstay, you have become an illegal alien--and now is not a good time in history to run afoul of immigration law.

Alan D

Merchant, in the post above has stated things clearly and accurately.

You have misread the rules on Indian visas, or have been misinformed.

cwcwdavid

ok I agree - I was guilty of Thai thinking about India.

For the benefit of any-one else reading this, what I suggested is definitely not possible. Search for visa extension on these forums for all the stories of people who have tried for lnger than 6 month - a second visa in a neighbour country ( extension is only 2 weeks when possible) after 6 months and succeeeded (or in a few cases not).

I have [ had ] already read India consulate sites from lots of places and I challenge anyone to find one that says explicitly more than that "visa are valid for 6 months". Which in practice seems to mean that you can stay in India whilst the visa is valid. I guess of course? Rather than meaning (as it does for Thai Visas, and I am talking about visas from consulates not entry stamps) that you can enter the country anytime for 6 months. Hehe not sure that is clearer but I'm no longer confused.

Dissappointing for me but my conclusion is that what I can expect (with some degree of certainty) is one 6-month visa per year. I wouldn't consider or recommend anyone to go illegal either. Even when it's unlikely you get caught the result is nasty when you do.

At this point I really don't want to accept these restrictions but it seems that if I want to be in asia (which I do) I'm going to have to accept some of them. An alternative is S.America (I am there now) where visas (not needed - they are all 3mo. stamps for euro-folk anyway) are very easy. Shame about the food and the european culture though. Great for those who like but I am really longing to get back to asia

It seems that a second 6-month visa is down to luck. Likely to be given with a UK passport - decent income but no guarantee. I am therefore adjusting my planning to I can stay 6-months a year in India at most and must do it in a single 6-month block. Not great - I hate being restricted by rules but in some ways better than the thai hassle since it's less time spent on the beaurocratic stuff.

Hmm now I wonder if Sri Lanka is any better ... and wandering totally OT, the reason the EU is wonderful is that for all it's citizens this issue doesn't exist. Unlike the WTO if a country and it's companies want to join you extend all these rights to all individuals not only trade rights to companies - wish my countrymen would start thinking like that - OT rant over, much as I'd wish it I can't see the EU ever extending it's system to cover India or even Thailand. Wonder how many others on this forum would wish it.

Thanks for replies here.

edwardseco

Merchant is spot on..

anjunaangel

why not just go to thailand and apply for a new 6 month indian tourist visa.this is what i did then you can go back to india for a full 6 months
have fun