Taking a serious view of China’s latest move to issue “separate” visas to Indian passport holders from Jammu and Kashmir, the government has told Beijing in no uncertain terms to put an immediate end to this practice or face a similar discrimination, besides fewer and tougher visas, for its own citizens seeking Indian visas.
The ministry of external affairs took up the matter with the Chinese embassy here and asked Beijing to stop discriminating against Indian nationals on the basis of their “ethnicity” and “domicile”.
The MHA, which handles immigration matters, has made it clear that it will not allow Indian passport holders with a non-stamped Chinese visa to leave the country. Also, it conveyed to Beijing through the MEA to either stop the practice of issuing Chinese visas to J&K and Arunachal Pradesh residents on a separate piece of paper — as against the stamped visas issued to all other Indian citizens — right away, or face a similar discriminatory regime in processing of Chinese applications for an Indian visa.
“How would they feel if India only offers a stamped visa to Tibetans while issuing visas on a separate paper for the applications residing in other parts of China,” commented a senior MHA official.
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