Indian Consulate in New York cautions against using unscrupulous agents for consular services

Consulate General of India in New York warns against fraudulent agents overcharging for consular services, emphasizes direct application process.

Amid instances of unscrupulous elements overcharging members of the Indian community for consular services and other fraudulent activities, India's mission in New York has cautioned against using such agents and highlighted measures undertaken by it to streamline visa, passport and other services for the diaspora.

Consul General of India in New York Binaya Pradhan told reporters here that several instances have come to the notice of the Consulate where various travel agents are "misusing people’s trust".

They have been charging higher amounts of money in the name of providing services.

Such unscrupulous elements have overcharged applicants for assistance in getting Consular services such as Overseas Citizen of India (OCI), visa, passport, and an emergency certificate. Mr. Pradhan cited instances where travel agents have charged as much as $450 to provide an emergency certificate to travel to India, while such a service costs only $17.

The Consulate said it has also come across instances where fake documents about identity, residential address, and utility bills have been submitted by the agents on the applicants’ behalf, often without the knowledge of the applicant. The Consulate said that this not only causes undue avoidable delay but is also a violation of prescribed Indian rules and puts the applicants on the wrong side of the law in the U.S.

The agents "claim that they have a relationship with the Consulate,” Mr. Pradhan said, adding that "they put our community members in trouble by providing false documents, fake certificates." Mr. Pradhan underscored that whether it is an Indian citizen, an American citizen, or an Indian-American person, they “don't have to come to us through an agent. You can come to us directly for the services that we provide at the Consulate. There is no requirement of using an agent, and on top of that to pay money, which is exorbitantly higher,” Mr. Pradhan added.

Additionally, Mr. Pradhan noted that it has also been brought to the Consulate’s notice that several fake E-visa websites, claiming to provide such services, are active on the internet. To mislead the applicants, some of these websites have created images and home page templates mimicking the Government of India’s websites.