This is the page on the AI website that I based my final decision that a visa was not required. My intra-India flight was AI102, which is one of those “international” domestic flights. That flight actually operates DEL-BOM-NYC. Having the DEL-BOM segment operate as “international”, means that whether a passenger boards at DEL or BOM, they go through passport control at their originating airport, since the flight departs from an international gate at DEL and arrives at and departs from an international gate at BOM. In my case, that meant that, per instructions on that page, when I arrived at DEL from KTM as an international passenger, I would proceed straight to the gate for AI102, staying in the international section of the terminal and never passing immigration and customs (as stated twice on that page). Similarly, again as per statements on that page, when I would have arrived at BOM I would have done so at an international gate, and then I would have proceeded to the international gate for AC47, again bypassing immigration and customs. If I never crossed an immigration line at DEL or BOM, I would have never officially “entered” the country, no immigration officer would have ever looked at my passport, so no visa would ever get checked. The information given on that page, while not directly addressing a scenario where this transit process takes place twice, clearly says that I should not even attempt to pass through immigration:

• You are not allowed to proceed or pass through immigration and Customs unless you fulfil other requisite criteria.

I read the last part of “other requisite criteria” as don’t go through immigration unless you have a visa. Since my transit process would have involved no interaction with immigration, I read that page as no visa is required if your entire stay in India is inside the international section of an airport.

I interpreted the “we’re sorry but the policy changed 5 days ago” statement of the AI agent at KTM as of 6 days prior I would have been able to complete this transit process through India without a visa (meaning my original interpretation of the referenced AI page was correct), but based on the policy change, dual transit scenarios such as mine were no longer allowed without a visa. This still doesn’t make sense to me, especially based on the instructions still in place on the AI page, since I would have never interacted with an immigration officer, and therefore they’d have no knowledge whether I was going through with a visa or not. The only place that could be enforced would be by the airline at the original embarkation point, which is what happened in my case. To save the potential naysayers the trouble, I understand that it’s possible that AI has not updated that page yet. But FWIW, I still have have not been able to find anything online that references such a policy change.

This is the page on the AI website that I based my final decision that a visa was not required.