Originally Posted by
MSY-MSP
Ok, I have tried to search and I am not too sure of the answer to this question, but am hoping you all can help out with this quandry/question.
Just found out that i will need to be going to India in a little over two weeks. I have a valid 10 year multi-entry Tourist visa (with close to 9.5 years left on it) in my recently cancelled passport (was comming close to the 6 month date). It has been over 3 months since i was there last. So i shouldn't have an issue with the return in 60 days thing. Now I know i can use the two passports to enter india, but here is where things get a little questionable.
The reason i am going to India is to meet with some of my clients (internal to my company, US based but with an office in India). We are going to do some meet and greets as well as some other company related stuff. Basically this is going to be for about a day and a half. Then we will have about a day or two for tourist things. Thus a mixed purpose trip.
From what it appears I "should" get a business visa for this trip. However, given the dates that i need to be there, getting the proper visa is not going to happen. First of all, i do not have my birth certificate, and getting a copy from california is not exactly quick (1 to 2 weeks if i am lucky). So there is no way that i can see to have the proper visa in hand in time.
Therefore, I am thinking of just going on the trip and using the tourist visa to enter. However, I am wondering if going to India for all of about 4 days will cause a problem at immigration either inbound or outbound. I figure that is the only place where the "purpose" of the trip would be questioned. Has anyone done a quick in and out trip to india on a tourist visa before?
I am currious to see what you all have to say.
Thanks
I have done hundreds of visits to India of the 1-day to 3-days duration on tourist visas for DEL alone. Even excluding the factor of which addresses I've been putting down on the forms (which hasn't resulted in any questioning except by the curious who may have remembered me and/or more probably recognize the non-hotel addresses I was using), they likely wouldn't have questioned me for anything since passport control usually doesn't question the likes of US citizens coming in on visas unless the form was not completed properly or a proper visa wasn't in the passport presented.
Departure passport control is almost certainly not going to make a fuss over your stay since they are far busier hassling Indian citizens and don't spend much or any time doing anything but trying to figure out where you entry stamp is so they can place the departure stamp next to it. They usually don't even say anything, presuming they don't have an issue finding your latest entry stamp. Much like arrival passport control, departure passport control rarely says much of anything either to foreign nationals.
HYD and BLR may be a bit more on the ball in terms of looking for people attempting to use a tourist visa to attend to work, but DEL and BOM passport control are not anywhere near as likely to do much of anything other than key in what needs to be keyed in and stamp what needs to be stamped.
"Socializing", like other touristy activities, is fine on a tourist visa.