Cabinet to discuss merging of PIO, OCI schemes for diaspora

NEW DELHI: The Cabinet will discuss tomorrow the issue of merging of two citizenship schemes for Indian diaspora -- Persons of Indian Origin ( PIO) and Overseas Citizenship of India ( OCI) -- to come up with new one which will have salient features of both of them.

The government had decided to grant OCI, commonly known as 'dual citizenship' in 2005 after the recommendation of the high-level committee on Indian diaspora.

According to the home ministry, people of certain category who migrated from India and acquired citizenship of a foreign country other than Pakistan and Bangladesh, are eligible for grant of OCI as long as their home countries allow dual citizenship in some form or the other under their local laws.

However, they cannot vote or hold any constitutional posts in India.

In the PIO cards scheme, there is no restriction of approval of dual citizenship from their home country. In addition to Pakistan and Bangladesh, people from China, Bhutan, Nepal, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka are not eligible for this scheme.

The government is contemplating to merge these two schemes to come up with one scheme which should have best features of the both, official sources said.