E-Paper
Integrated portal to speed up visa approvals for foreign production experts
India simplifies visa process for foreign professionals, including Chinese experts, via an integrated online portal for production-related activities.
Foreign professionals, including Chinese experts, needed for production-related activities in India, will now get visas easily and expeditiously through an integrated portal after their Indian sponsors generate sponsorship invites online, a senior government official said on Wednesday.
The integrated online facility will issue the e-Production Investment Business Visa (e-B-4 Visa). The portal will seamlessly connect three key ministries — industry, home and external affairs to facilitate issuance of the visa, the official said.
The system is now open for such visa applications, the official, working in the department for promotion of industry and internal trade (DPIIT), said, asking not to be named. DPIIT, an arm of the commerce and industry ministry, is coordinating with the industry to facilitate their manufacturing activities that often require specialists.
“The easier visa system for foreign professionals will secure visas for such applicants for at least one month and maximum for six months. While this facility was earlier limited to only for companies selected under the production-linked incentive (PLI) schemes, the government has now opened this window for all companies from November 29,” the official said.
So far 129 companies have applied for sponsoring different specialists through this system by giving specific details of each individual. Once company-specific applications are approved, specialists named in the approval sponsorship letters can apply for the visa.
A statement issued by the ministry of commerce and industry confirmed the development: “The launch of this digital platform is a part of a series of reforms that the Government of India has instituted under the business visa regime for improving the ease of doing business in India.”
In August 2025, the home ministry issued a circular for resolving certain issues related to employment visa, business visa and e-PLI business. As part of this circular, two activities which were earlier covered under the employment visa namely, foreign nationals coming for installation and commissioning of equipment as part of contract of supply of equipment and for which Indian companies pay fees or royalty, are now brought under the business visa regime, it said.
Further, a new sub-category of “Production Investment Visa” has been created under the business visa regime and called the “B-4 Visa” for enabling foreign subject matter specialists, or engineers, or technical people being engaged by Indian companies under the following categories -- installation and commissioning; quality check and essential maintenance; production; IT and ERP ramp-up; training; supply chain development for empaneling vendors, plant design and bring-up; and senior management and executives to visit India for such production investment activities seamlessly, it said.
As part of this reform, this Production Investment Visa will be issued as an e-visa and has to be applied for in the online visa portal. Further, to facilitate the visa application process for e-B-4 visa, Indian companies shall generate sponsorship letter digitally. For enabling this facilitation digitally, DPIIT had launched the e-Production Investment Business registration module on the National Single Window System (NSWS) on November 29, 2025, which can be availed by PLI as well as non-PLI businesses.
Processes have been streamlined with simpler forms and recommendation requirement of the line ministry has been done away with, it said. With this module, Indian companies and Limited Liability Partnerships (LLPs) can instantly generate sponsorship letters for inviting foreign professionals for production related activities under the e-B-4 visa category on NSWS (https://www.nsws.gov.in), it added.
“The auto population of data and automatic authentication through existing data bases like MCA, GSTN etc have eliminated the requirement of approval of line ministry,” the statement said. The unique ID of the generated sponsorship letter shall be referred by foreign professional when he applies for visa on the e-Visa portal (https://indianvisaonline.gov.in) where the module has been integrated with NSWS through API, it said.
