15.24 lakh foreigners visited India in 2021
New Delhi: Over 15 lakh foreigners, including 4.29 lakh US nationals and 2.4 lakh Bangladeshis, had visited India last year when the country was on an extended period of Coronavirus restrictions and visa regulations, officials said.
Ten countries accounted for 74.39 per cent of the total arrival of foreigners during 2021, while 25.61 per cent of the incoming foreigners were from the rest of the nations, a home ministry official said.
A total of 15,24,469 foreigners visited India between January 1 and December 31, 2021.
The maximum number of foreigners who visited India during this period were from the United States (4,29,860), followed by those from Bangladesh (2,40,554), the United Kingdom (1,64,143), Canada (80,437) and Nepal (52,544).
As many as 36,451 citizens from Afghanistan, 33,864 nationals from Australia, 33,772 from Germany, 32,064 from Portugal and 30,374 citizens of France visited India during 2021, the official said.
All international flights were suspended during the nationwide lockdown, which was first announced in India from March 25 to April 21 in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic and it was extended thrice till May 31.
Even though the government had announced the gradual reopening of various activities from June 2020, many restrictions continued for the remaining months of 2020 and a few months in 2021.
Scheduled international flights from India to international destinations remained suspended for two years from March 25, 2020, till March 27, 2022. During this period, international flights were operated only under the 'air-bubble' arrangements, the official said.
There were visa restrictions too on foreigners travelling to India after the Coronavirus outbreak.
In order to control its spread, the home ministry took a series of steps to curtail the inward and outward movement of international passengers, both foreigners as well as Indians, in a calibrated manner since February 2020.
With the phased unlocking in India, the Central government has relaxed the visa and travel restrictions in a phased manner since May 2020. Continued on P4
