Do NRIs Deserve This Treatment?

It's appalling to know that the government of India has levied a $175 fee besides increasing the hassles for Persons of Indian Origin by retroactive enforcement of rules regarding the surrender of Indian passport by those who have acquired citizenship of other countries. The new rules impose undue and unnecessary burden on Indians who have foreign passports.

The new rules also require that an applicant who has lost, damaged or surrendered his/her Indian passport to a foreign Government, he/she should furnish certified copies of the following documents: Details of last held Indian passport (Passport No., Date of Issue & Place of issue). The onus of providing details rest on the applicant; Official documents submitted to authorities of new country at the time of obtaining citizenship/naturalization & documents used for entry such as US Form I –130; Notarized letter explaining reasons for loss; and police report.

A large majority of the new citizens, who do not have any use for their old Indian passports may have lost, misplaced or never kept in their possession after naturalization. The production of items will not be easy and could take months to obtain from the immigration authorities. Meanwhile, consular services will not be available to visit the mother country, even for emergency situations. The notice posted on the website of several Indian embassies and consulates stipulates that Persons of Indian Origin who have acquired citizenship of other countries are required to surrender their Indian passports within 90 days of their gaining overseas citizenship and obtain ‘Surrender Certificate' from the nearest Indian Consulate. There should not be any objection in surrendering the old Indian passport. However, the new rules impose heavy service fee and even higher penalty for failing to do so. These rules are unwarranted and burdensome, practically as well as monetarily. For a family of two-four persons the fees plus penalties could run in a few thousand dollars, which is ridiculous and deter them from traveling to India even in emergency situations.

Besides what irks more is the arbitrariness of the implementation of the new rules, which were imposed without any prior announcement or notice period. One goes to the consulate to get visas to travel to India and is stunned to find that he/she can no longer do so unless he/she can produce the passport, which they may have not used for last 20-30 years probably! The new regulations are totally unjustified and utterly bureaucratic.

Is this the reward for all the hard work of the Indian community in getting the civil nuclear treaty passed in US Congress and all the contributions NRIs have made in the development of the Indian economy?

The government of India should repeal the penalty charges with immediate effect, educate the community first and charge reasonable fees and remove the retroactive enforcement of the new rules.