Last updated: December 17th, 2019 5:41 PM

Indian Residency for Foreign Investors

The Union Cabinet under the Chairmanship of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has approved a scheme for grant of Indian Permanent Residency to foreign investors. In this article, we look at the scheme for Indian Residency for Foreign Investors in detail.

FDI in India

The Government of India has taken aggressive steps to increase Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inflow into India. To increase FDI, the Government has taken many steps as follows:

• Easier regime and faster processing of application for registering a company in India 
• FDI has been allowed into LLPs
• Sectoral caps of FDI have been relaxed
• Redundant government processes have been removed

Know more about the procedures for foreign nationals to start a company in India. The above steps introduced by the Government has tremendously improved the ease of doing business in India and increased interest for investment into India amongst Foreign investors. To further attract investors, the Government has now introduced a scheme for providing Indian Residency to Foreign Investors.

Indian Residency to Foreign Investors

The scheme for providing Indian Residency to Foreign Investors will provide permanent residency to foreign investors for 10 years with multiple entry. The permanent residency provided to the foreign national can be renewed for a further period of 10  years, subject to the foreign national not coming under any adverse notice.

FRRO Registration Relaxation

Typically, foreign nationals staying in India are required to register themselves and obtain FRRO registration. However, the same would be relaxed for those having permanent residency.

Purchase of Residential Property

There are various restrictions on purchase of property by foreign nationals in India. Under the scheme, foreign nationals would have an allowance to purchase one residential property for staying purposes.

Spouse & Dependents

The spouse and dependents of Indian permanent residency holder would be allowed to take up employment in India (in relaxation to salary stipulations for Employment Visa) and/or undertake studies in India without any visa restrictions.

Eligibility Criteria

The Indian Permanent Residency scheme is applicable only to foreign investors fulfilling the following eligibility conditions:

• Invest a minimum of Rs. 10 crores (Approximately USD1.5 Million) within 18 months or Rs.25 crores(Approximately USD3.75 Million) within 36 months; AND
• The investment should result in employment to at least 20 resident Indians every financial year.