desi

OCI process require some online work to be done on website of both Govt of India and outsourced vendor CKGS.
Then documents are to be sent to CKGS who are gatekeeper for verifying before forwardibg it to GoI.

So you need to pass CKGS checkpoint before actual work can even get started on your application.

CKGS have 5 page long instructions just on Photographs (YES, five pages long)
With strict warning that those out of compliance will be rejected.

Background Color
As per CKGS, you CAN NOT use passport picture that is identicle to what is on your passport (logic? Mera Bharat Mahan)
It specifies that background has to be WHITE color.
They receive the actual paper photograph as part of the paper application.

This photograph has to be same as one uploaded on GoI website as party of GoI part of the unnecessarily convoluted process.

GoI part of application state sthat Phot background CAN NOT be WHITE.

So how are other people handling this conflict?

Related query:
Parent cannot sign on behlaf of mionr child.
CKGS insist on left thumb impression of baby girl.
GoI insust on right thumb impression of baby girl
How are people handling this contradiction?
Does it even matter?

One friend said that when he applied for his kid, child was in India.
So he used his cat. May be he was kidding.
But how do you comply with contradicting rules if you knowingly dont want to break any idiotic rules?

Keyser

just send in the application & pray....there is a good chance they aren't following their own rules in the first place....

desi

@Keyser, your advice is golden as always.

OCI process has 5.5 pages worth of instructions for photographs alone.
Can confirm that they dont follow what is written in that document.
- white/non-white background doesnt matter
- positioning of head doesnt have to match requirement perfectly
- photo used in US passport CAN BE used (irrespective what they say on websites)

Need 2 passport photos, 1 money order or cashier's check, 1 copy of state ID, 1 copy of new passport, 1 notarized statement that you have original passport in your possession and 2 ibuprofen and 6 hours of patience to submit re-issue app (split over two web sites which can crash in middle)
NYCGI/CKGS process them in a week as everything is now done locally in NYC. Each stop is processing it within hours.
But there are 3 stops and transit between these stop and your home is about 95% of total time.
Other offices take significantly longer

Love_Travel

Thanks for sharing. I am going thro the Process as I just got a new passport. If we don't send the new passport, how do they stamp the U visa in the US Passport?

oliver2002

The passports are no longer 'stamped', you just get a new OCI card with the new passport details. Also they update their systems with the new passport number, so when you travel with the new passport their systems already know you have access via OCI.

hyderago

I can only share my wife's experience last year... her US passport and OCI have the same photo, that too with a white background!

desi

Thanks for the datapoint.
Post #3 also had a recent datapoint with same observation.
(5.5 pages of instructions are not being enforced)

GUWonder

They don't police very consistently for the "requirement" to have the passport photo not be the same as the photo for the OCI. If the issue was that they they were getting years' old photos taken at the same time as years' old passports and that they wanted the OCI applicant's photo to have been taken within X days/months of application, they could have said that the applicant's photo should be less than _____ days/months old at time of application. But this is the GOI, so that isn't how it goes.

If your passport is less than a year old, maybe they are less fussy. Or maybe they are just less inconsistent (or is that more inconsistent? ) then.

oliver2002

The Chinese also are paranoid about the pictures you submit for visa. Under no circumstance are they supposed to be similar or same to the picture in your passport.