MEA holds talks to streamline student visa process for Indians

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The processing of all Australian visas to take almost six months
Source: Twitter

Senior leaders in the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) India had talks with the heads of missions and senior diplomats from different countries to streamline the visa process. The information was revealed in a tweer sent out by Arindam Bagchi, the official Spokesperson for MEA.

Mr Bagchi reported that the nations included in this discussion are the United States of America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, as well as Euorpean nations such as the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland and the United Kingdom.

In a second tweet, he continued to report that the countries have ‘agreed to remain engaged on further easing and fast-tracking the process since the flow of students has been mutually beneficial.

As COVID-19 restrictions ease, students and working professionals look to join their colleges or workplaces. However, a major hurdle is proving to be long visa wait times as several nations report visa backlogs hurting the immigration process. LeverageEdu.com has recently reported that students are missing course start dates due to UK visa delays.

Canada’s immigration backlog has recently grown to a staggering 2.4 million, with close to 30% of the cases being Indians. IRCC, the Canadian visa agency, has said that it is taking several remedial measures to ease this backlog.

The recent talks reported by Mr Bagchi can be seen as India ramping up its efforts to ease the visa delivery process for students going abroad. Recently, the USA scrapped visa interview for previous visa holders.

Additionally, the embassy is also preparing to grant a record number of 100,000 visas to Indian students this year beating the last year’s record number fo 62,000 by a wide margin.

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