Visa on arrival list expanded to woo tourists

May 6, 2012
visa

New Delhi, May 6: Taking India's Tourist Visa on Arrival (TVoA) policy to a new level, the ministry of external affairs (MEA) has approved the facility for residents of France, Germany and Russia. Now, TVoA is given to residents of only 11 countries, of which only two - Finland and Luxembourg - are in Europe.

New Zealand is the only other non-Asian country to enjoy the facility. Confirming the development to TOI, MEA sources said the decision will help the government meet its objective to double the international tourist footfall in the next three-four years. This is the first time India's TVoA policy will cover P5 countries in the form of France and Russia.

"After the go-ahead from MEA, the proposal has been sent to the Union home ministry as the final TVoA clearing authority is its Bureau of Immigration but that is a mere formality," said a source, adding that there was a consensus among all ministries involved in extending the policy to these three countries.

"The criteria for providing the facility to any country include security implication - how much is the presence in that country of people inimical to India's interests - and tourist inflow from there. These three major countries made the cut but 6 other nations too will soon get the approval," added the source.

The names of these countries are not yet confirmed, but these may include Spain and Malta. There still, however, seems no consensus within the government on including the names of some central Asian countries in the list. "In this regard, names of countries like Kazakhstan and Ukraine are being discussed positively, but they may have to wait for a while," said an official.

TOI had reported in January that the TVoA could be extended to include 13 other countries, including France, Germany and Russia, after a review of the policy by the PMO in which it was decided that security concerns should not necessarily hamper the extension of the policy.

The government is also not looking at mutual reciprocity in extending the policy as France, Germany and Russia don't offer VoA to Indians. As an official said, the main idea is to attract international tourist traffic and turn India into a major tourist destination.

India currently issues VoA to 11 countries like Japan, Indonesia, the Philippines, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Singapore, Myanmar, Finland, Luxembourg and New Zealand.

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News Network
May 11,2020

New Delhi, May 11: Shares of Indian Railway Catering And Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) jumped 5 per cent in early trade on Monday after the Indian Railways said it will gradually resume passenger train services from May 12.

The company's shares gained 5 per cent to Rs 1,302.85 -- its highest trading permissible limit for the day -- on the BSE. At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), it rose 5 per cent to Rs 1,303.55 -- its upper circuit limit.

Booking for reservation in these trains will start at 4pm on May 11 and will be available only on the IRCTC website.

The Indian Railways will gradually resume passenger train services from May 12 and will ask passengers to arrive at the station at least an hour before departure, the national transporter said on Sunday.

Initially, the all air-conditioned services will begin on 15 Rajdhani routes and the fare would be equivalent to that of the super-fast train, it said.

The special trains will run from New Delhi to Dibrugarh, Agartala, Howrah, Patna, Bilaspur, Ranchi, Bhubaneswar, Secunderabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Thiruvananthapuram, Madgaon, Mumbai Central, Ahmedabad and Jammu Tawi.

All passenger services were suspended due to a lockdown announced on March 25 and the railways later started the on-demand Shramik Specials to ferry migrants stranded across the country. It, however, has been running freight and parcel services.

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Agencies
January 12,2020

New Delhi, Jan 12: A fact-finding committee of the Congress on the JNU violence on Sunday said the January 5 attack inside the university campus was "state-sponsored" and recommended Vice Chancellor M Jagadesh Kumar be dismissed and criminal investigation initiated against him.

The Congress had appointed a four-member fact-finding committee to carry out a detailed inquiry into the violence at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).

Sushmita Dev, member of the committee, said the committee recommended that Kumar should be dismissed immediately and all the appointments in faculty should be probed and independent inquiry should take place.

"Criminal investigation must take place against the VC and faculty members and the security company," the Mahila Congress chief said.

"It is clear that the attack on JNU campus was state-sponsored," Dev said.

She also demanded a complete rollback of the JNU fee hike.

The other members of the fact-finding committee are Hibi Eden, MP and former NSUI president, Syed Naseer Hussain, MP and former president of JNU NSUI and Amrita Dhawan, a former NSUI president and ex-DUSU president.

On January 5 night, masked people armed with rods and sticks stormed the JNU campus and assaulted students and faculty members, and vandalised property, leaving several people injured.

Leftist outfits and the RSS-affiliated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) blamed each other for the violence.

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News Network
January 18,2020

Jammu, Jan 18: Prepaid mobile connections were restored in Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday and 2G services resumed in two districts of the valley after being disconnected on August 5 last year. Voice and SMS facilities were restored for all local prepaid mobile phones across the Union territory.

Rohit Kansal, the principal secretary to the administration of Jammu and Kashmir said the order will come into effect from Saturday.

In order to consider giving mobile Internet connectivity on such SIM cards, the telecom service providers will have to verify the credentials of the subscribers, he said.

Internet service providers have been asked to provide fixed line Internet connectivity in all the 10 districts of Jammu region and two districts, Kupwara and Bandipora, in North Kashmir.

Telecom services were shut in the entire Jammu and Kashmir on August 5 when the Centre abrogated special status to the erstwhile state and also bifurcated it into two Union Territories.

However, the Supreme Court came down heavily on the UT administration last week for arbitrarily shutting down the Internet, the facility described as the fundamental right by the apex court.

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