E-Tourist Visa scheme registers 2713% growth in November

By Tasmayee Laharoy

KOLKATA: A total of 83,501 international tourists arrived in the country on E-Tourist Visa in November 2015 as compared to 2,968 during the month of October, 2014 registering a growth of 2713.4%.

While UK continued to top the list of tourists who availed the e visa facility, USA, France and Germany were among the other countries that followed suit.

Between January and November, 2015 a total of 3,41,683 tourist arrived on e-Tourist Visa as compared to 24,963 during January-November, 2014 registering a growth of 1268.8% . This high growth may be attributed to introduction of e-Tourist Visa for 113 countries as against coverage of earlier TVoA (tourist visa on arrival) scheme for 12 countries.

UK contributed 23.93% to the growth in numbers of e-visa arrivals, followed by USA at 16.33%, Russian Federation at 8.17%, France at 7.64% and Germany at 5.60% an Australia at 4.82% respectively.

Tourist Visa on Arrival (TVoA) enabled by Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA), presently known as E-Tourist Visa scheme was launched on November 27, 2014. At present e-Tourist Visa facility is available for citizens of 113 countries arriving at 16 Airports in India.