Valid Indian visa in an expired passport

Question

I recently had to renew my passport. The expired one has an Indian visa that will be valid until 2016. Is it necessary for me to get the visa transferred to the renewed passport, or can I get through customs in India (likely Mumbai) if I have both the expired and the renewed passports with me?

Answer 1

Yes, you will simply need to present both passports and you will be fine, as long as a few simple conditions are met.

• The old and new passports must be in the same name. (ie, if you've changed your name then your Visa may no longer be valid)

• The old and new passports will need to be from the same country (ie, if you've changed citizenship then your Visa is likely no longer valid)

• The Visa must be undamaged. When a new passport is issued most countries will physically invalidate the old passport, such as by cutting off part of the photo page. If the Visa itself was damaged then it is no longer valid.

This is the specific information from TIMATIC (the visa service used by most airlines/etc) :

• Valid visas in expired passports are still acceptable, provided accompanied by a valid passport of the same nationality of the expired passport.

Presuming none of the items above are issues, just present both passports and explain the situation and you'll have no problems.