Indian Visa Woes Continue

I'm already here in India yet my visa woes persist.

My entry to India had been marked by a very "interesting" experience with the Embassy of India in Manila. Now, the Bureau of Immigration in India is making me jump through hoops.

Is it me or India just doesn't like me?

My new problem cropped up when I was registering in the Foreigners Registration Office (FRO) in Bangalore. Foreigners who enter India with certain types of visas are mandated to register at the local FRO. I'm carrying an Employment Visa (EV) and when I arrived at the FRO to register, I was told that my registration cannot be accepted because my documents from Infosys do not have the word "employment" in them. Instead, it contains "internship." For the Indian FRO official at that time, that was unquestionably unacceptable and I must do 2 things: (1) Get a student visa; or (2) get Infosys to rework all my papers so that it would fit the FRO's criteria to the letter (or the FRO official's interpretation of it), but that would entail a more work and payments. Whatever option I take, it would take time and take away my attention from my project.

Looking back, this situation could have avoided had I gotten a Student Visa (SV) from the Indian Embassy in Manila. However, I couldn't produce the necessary documents such as an "Admission Letter from a recognized Educational Institution in India" as stated in the SV requirements of the Indian Embassy in Manila. This misalignment between the Manila office and the local Indian offices has come to bite me in the a$$.

The past couple of days have been very distracting and the preoccupation and uncertainty have definitely affected me. (Will I be deported? or Will I be held in immigration when I go home?) I hope this situation gets resolved soon.

Comments

Anonymous said…
have you tried informing the phil consulate there in india about your problem?

ingat ka na lang dyan
Anonymous said…
go home! next time do your internship in south east asia ;-) whoops, next time? that didn't sound right.
Unknown said…
@ precy & pet:

Thanks for your "support". :P
Anonymous said…
Tell InsoSys this is THEIR problem, not yours. They should have been more thorough about their pre-arrival information. I wonder if this isn't the first time this has happened to one of their interns. Either they get someone to work on it for you (so you can concentrate on your work) or you abandon your work until you fix it with the bureaucracy (read "bureau-crazy"). Hang in there, Regnard.
Dawn said…
Hi…
I don’t think its your problem Regnard! You should stick to it as Infosys should have taken care of this and not put you in such a situation. This is cruel.
I am a Canadian citizen came to US and came to know I can apply for Overseas Citizen of India visa which will allow me to go to India any time forever and guess what….I haven’t heard from them its been 4 months now where as their SLA is 2-3 weeks :O
Imagine!!!
I wish good luck to you but certainly shouldn’t go through this trauma.

Cheers,
Dawn
Visa Consultant said…
This post is very useful for those people who are used to for travel world wide and who are always to ready for go abroad, specially for those people who want to go European countries like UK. You blog is not a blog it is a informational guide for us. we appreciate your work. Keep it up

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