SOLVED: Long delay in getting OCI
Hi,
I am a member of immigrationboards since 2010, and used its extensive info from fellow members, for my journey from a normal residing Indian citizen, to Tier-1 General visa in 2010, to ILR in 2015, to finally UK passport and Indian OCI in 2016. I faced some major problems in getting OCI for my family (wife and kid), in spite of complete paperwork and a ‘normal case’. A few months back that problem was solved, and I thought to share that experience and how I got rid of that problem, on the immigrationboards, as I am quite indebted to this board for all the help I had got throughout my journey, just by reading people posting their date updates, and discussing various issues.
If you are not having any OCI issues, you can stop reading here, if you want
. But if you are facing any long delays in getting OCI (more than average durations posted by other people), then I think this post is a must read for you.
So, I am a family with wife and a kid. We entered UK in 2010 on Tier-1 general visa and my path till UK passport in 2016 was pretty smooth. After that we wanted to move back to India and applied for Indian OCI, where the problem started. We applied on 02-May-2016 at London VFS, for all three of us. Ack date came 03-May. On 25-May, Govt status website updated ‘Documents Printing Status’ to PROCESSED, but only for me. For my wife & kid, it was still showing ‘UNDER PROCESS’.
I came to immigrationboards forum and tried to see the typical timelines. It was perfectly matching for me, and 90% people had got their OCI within those time frames. I thought it will soon be processed for my wife and kid as well, and so I took a bet. My kid’s new school in India was starting in June, so I took a months’ margin from 25-May and booked the tickets for June-end. My OCI arrived in London on 01-June – exact expected timeline. But for my wife& kid, time passed and their OCI status stayed at ‘UNDER PROCESS’. I kept calling VFS but they said application is fine and nothing is asked from HCI, and we just need to wait. Around 20-June, I sort of panicked, and as an emergency measure applied for their 6-months short term Indian visa (mind that our Indian passports were now cancelled, so no other way to enter India).
Within India, we got busy settling and few months passed, but surprisingly their OCI status still stayed at ‘UNDER PROCESS’. Website says that you should get your OCI within 42 days of application, and if there is any delay, they’ll tell the reason. But for us, there was no reason sent, even after 60 days. I kept calling VFS (from India, at 95p per minute), but same response. I went searching for any OCI helpline on India Govt. website, but to my utter surprise, there was not even a single helpline number. There was only one email id mentioned at
https://passport.gov.in/oci/ –
helpdesk-oci@gov.in. I sent many mails there, but not even a single reply. Not trusting Govt. now and to avoid the last minute panic again, I tried searching for alternate options.
I discussed with people, and came to know of RTI – which one can put to any Govt. agency, including OCI, and they have to reply in 1 month or some action taken. Since I was an OCI holder (an OCI holder can apply), I put an RTI application to MHA, giving details of my wife & kid’s applications and asking for status. I took help from a private company who charged 200 Rs. to frame a good RTI application (you can find it if you google online rti). In parallel, I kept trying other ways to contact MHA. After 20 days, finally I got a phone list of various ministers and their under-secretaries from MHA website. I started calling them. They picked the phone, but kept on forwarding me to different people, until I reached the person who heads OCI process. I was lucky to be able to talk to him directly, and after listening, he confirmed that my wife & kid’s OCIs had just been released last week. You won’t imagine how much relief I got after hearing those words. When asked for reason for delay, he said there was some internal delay. Within ~10 days, their documents printing status on website was changed to ‘PROCESSED’ and OCIs sent to London.
The story after that is still interesting on how I finally got OCIs in my hand, since I had no plan to go to UK in foreseeable future, and what happened to the RTI application response. But with 99% surety, I could say that their OCIs were unblocked because of the RTI application I had put.
So few things to take away:
- If your OCI processing is taking more time than average, get alerted. There are some dead holes in Govt. systems which, if you are unlucky, end up sucking your application
- Consider putting an RTI application, but only if the delay is more than 42 days. Any Indian passport holder, or OCI holder, can apply it for you. RTI puts a lot of pressure on Govt. agencies. Filing an RTI is simple, thanks to some private companies.
- For OCI there is no helpline number. If you are not getting response on OCI email helpline, and it is more than 42 days of application, try calling phone numbers of MHA website (
http://mha.nic.in/sites/upload_files/mh ... ellist.pdf) - see relevant phone numbers there.
Wish you all the best.
Thanks.
Two Royal Mail special delivery envelopes. 
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