Blitz Bureau
UNION Home Minister Amit Shah on May 19 launched the revamped portal of the OCI with an up-to-date user interface to make registration of Indian-origin people seamless. The new portal will provide enhanced functionality, advanced security, and a user-friendly experience for the existing over five million OCI cardholders and new users.
The Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) scheme was introduced in 2005. It provides for registration as OCI all Persons of Indian Origin (PIOs) who were citizens of India on January 26, 1950, or thereafter or were eligible to become citizens on January 26, 1950, or their descendants.
“… launched the revamped OCI portal with an up-to-date user interface to make registration of overseas citizens seamless. The new features will include improved functionality, enhanced security, and a user-friendly experience,” Shah said in a post on X. The revamped OCI portal is accessible at ociservices.gov.in/onlineOCI, he added.
According to the Home Ministry, the existing OCI Services portal was developed in 2013 and is currently operational in over 180 Indian missions abroad as well as 12 Foreigners Regional Registration Offices (FRROs), processing approximately 2,000 applications per day. Given the significant technological advancements over the past decade and feedback received from OCI cardholders, a revamped OCI portal has been developed to address existing limitations and enhance the user experience.