Visa Policies Fail to Keep Up With India’s Growing Travel Market

For a country that has produced the likes of Google CEO Pichai Sundararajan, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Novartis’ Vasant Narasimhan, Pepsico’s Indra Nooyi, and a whole lot of other brilliant, high-profile people, India still gets shoddy treatment with visas for its traveling citizens.

One would think that by now — with such luminaries helming Fortune 500 companies, and with India’s expanding middle class — countries globally would have recalibrated their idea of the Indian traveler, which would seem to be mired in the slums.

Indians love to travel yet countries are prejudiced against the Indian passport. Visa applications require such evidence as sufficient funds to cover the travel and are tedious — just look at what Australia wants in the article below and why this has resulted in visa processing delays.

Those requirements are not unusual for emerging markets. But from where we sit in the Skift Asia office, it’s hard to think of India as an emerging market in the same way as, say, Myanmar. Like travel advisories, there are layers of the word “emerging.” One thinks of Bangalore, India’s own Silicon Valley, young and hungry entrepreneurs, and yes, those high-flying CEOs. It’s a rising giant with 1.3 billion people, loads of them having traveled and endured onerous visa procedures because of their love for travel.

Surely it’s high time to review and ease some of the visa policies for India. Countries have been quick to ease visa restrictions for Chinese travelers. Why not do the same for Indians?

India will generate 6.5 million outbound luxury travelers and meetings/incentives participants by 2020, tipped a Mastercard report in 2017. Australia, which is hosting the Cricket World Cup 2020, will not want to miss the chance of attracting cricket-crazy Indians. Why not make the event the impetus to rethink visa policies for Indians?

— Raini Hamdi, Skift Asia Editor, [email protected], @RainiHamdi

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Asia Editor Raini Hamdi [[email protected]] curates the Skift Asia Weekly newsletter. Skift emails the newsletter every Wednesday.

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