Merger of PIO and OCI Cards
The Person of Indian Origin (PIO) card scheme has been withdrawn. It may also please be noted that the International Civil Aviation Organization has specified that only machine readable travel documents would be acceptable w.e.f. October 2018. The PIO cards being handwritten documents, will become invalid travel documents w.e.f. this date. Those travelling to India on the strength of hand written PIO cards beyond October 2018, would be refused entry at the Indian Immigration counters and sent back. All PIO card holders are, therefore, required to convert it to OCI card at the earliest.
The Ministry of Home Affairs, in consultation with Foreign Ministry, has decided to extend the date for submission of the application for registration as OCI cardholder by the erstwhile PIO cardholders till March 31, 2020.
External Affairs Minister has announced that the conversion of PIO cards into OCI cards will be done free-of-charge (gratis) for applications submitted until March 31, 2020.. After that the conversion will be done with a fee.
Erstwhile PIO card holders are advised to submit the application for issuing of OCI card (in lieu of valid PIO cards). Please refer to the link https://passport.gov.in/oci for details.
Fees (US $)
The fee for conversion of PIO card to OCI card is US $ 102
For details on filing OCI application, see the link https://passport.gov.in/oci/ .
In case of any problem, you may contact the Service Centre (Ref: www.blsindia.sg )