OCI cards a big hit with Indian Americans

IT was on January 7 last at the third Pravasi Bharatiya Divas meet in Hyderabad that two American citizens Nivruti Rai and Iftekhar Shareef were handed over the first two Overseas Citizens of India (OCI) cards by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

This marked the launch of the eagerly awaited OCI card scheme of India, which offered the Indian diaspora an opportunity to get privileges available to any Indian citizen, except a few, including voting rights.

The OCI scheme, which took several years to take its present shape and a lot of lobbying by the overseas Indian community, 11 months after its official launch, has received an enthusiastic response in the United States.

Statistics available with The Indian Express indicate that at least every two out of five OCI card holder is an American. Till October 31, officials said as many as 70,192 OCI cards have been issued by the Indian government, of which 31,246 were to American citizens tracing their roots to India.

Since January, when the Indian Consulates in the USNew York, Houston, Chicago and San Francisco and the Indian Embassy started accepting applications for OCI cards, more than 32,000 American citizens have applied. Globally over 77,000 people have applied for the OCI card since then.

It is a big hit USA, a senior Embassy official told The Indian Express. In countries like Mexico and Romania, only one OCI card has been issued so far. In fact, all the four consulates and the Indian Embassy have been facing a huge rush of applications for the OCI cards with officials often putting in extra hours to clear them.

The greatest rush for OCI cards in the US seems to be at the New York Consulate, which caters to the needs of New York, New Jersey region it has the largest concentration of Indian Americans in the US. In fact, one out of seven OCI card holders is from this part of the country, an official said.

Till October 31, the New York Consulate had dispatched 10,942 OCI cards, followed by San Francisco (7,543), which has the second largest concentration of Indian Americans in California.

London in Great Britain, which has a significant number of Indians, is slightly above the Houston Consulate which has issued 5,232 OCI Cards so far. The Indian High Commission in London has issued 5,573 OCI cards. The other consulates in the USA, Chicago (with 3,991 OCI Cards) and Washington D.C. (3,538) are ranked eighth and tenth respectively, the figures reveal.

As for the OCI applications received, New York again topped the list with 11,332 till October 31, followed by San Francisco (8,045), London (5,963) and Houston (5,672). Chicago Consulate (4128) and Washington D.C. Embassy (3709) ranked ninth and 10th respectively in a long list of 85 missions.

According to officials, the US has witnessed more popularity of the OCI cards than any other country like Canada, Australia or England.