Why Iran is Offering Free Visa to Indians? 58 Countries Grant FREE VISA to INDIANS
Indian tourists and foreign travellers have big good news On 14 December 2023, Iran announced a visa-free entry for Indians Meaning, whenever you feel like it, you can go to Iran Islamic country Iran has given India a big gift You can travel abroad without a visa In fact, Hong Kong is giving Indians travel tickets worth Rs 5 lakhs for free But just think about it, Iran This is the same Iran that 43 years ago, to destroy India, provided fighter jets to Pakistan This is the same Iran whose relations with Pakistan are so deep that the Iranian president calls Pakistan a brother.
But today, how did Iran suddenly turn around? Iran is literally ignoring its brother Pakistan and giving Indians visa-free access.
Why is there so much love for Indians all of a sudden?
there is a very important reason behind this Which we will understand later But you know, for now, many experts believe that the attempt to attract Indian tourists to Iran is going to be useless Because many laws of Iran are so strict They can only say that until the law is fixed, you will probably want to step into their country
And you will soon understand why I am saying this and talking about Iran, Iran is not the only country that wants to attract Indian tourists to Iran, apart from Iran today, suddenly, attracting Indian tourists. A strange trend has started all over the world. Almost every country in the world wants to invite Indian tourists to their country.
Why 58 Countries are Grant FREE visas to INDIANS?
58 countries have literally changed their visa policies, as I told you, take the case of Hong Kong, one step further, it is giving airline tickets worth up to Rs 5 lakh to Indians for free, just so that Indians can travel to their country. It’s hard to believe, it’s true. , The question here is what have we Indians done? What have we done that we are getting so much respect from countries all over the world? And even if those countries are countries with anti-India stance?
On 14 December 2023, the Iranian government announced a visa-free entry for Indians.
Now any Indian can come to Iran whenever they want without any visa charges or prior permission But interestingly, Iran had this idea suddenly and accidentally, right? But it was because of an experiment done a few years ago So, a few years ago, Iran gave its friendly countries like Turkey, Oman, and China Visa-free access on a trial basis Now, within just 8 months, of this one change, Iran’s tourism sector grew by 48.
5% And because of this rise, 14 lakh Iranian jobs were created in this sector In fact, can you imagine, because of this one move, Iran’s economy in 8 months It has earned a triple of Bhutan’s GDP, which is 6.2 billion dollars So, after seeing so much profit, Iran had understood one thing very well When just by giving exemption to a few countries, problems like its economy and unemployment are being solved very easily So, why not execute it on a large scale? And that’s why, Iran gave visa exemption to India, but with India, it also gave visa exemptions to 33 other countries as well
the thing to note here is that, there are small countries like Maldives here But not Pakistan The reason is quite simple Because many illegal immigrants from Pakistan go to Iran and never come back And regarding this issue, there are many conflicts between both countries Now, in such a situation, if they are given visa-free access, then Pakistani immigrants will enter Iran at night Because of which, this decision for Iran can prove to be an economic burden more than economic profit Interestingly, if you look at Iran’s visa-free list carefully, then you will see a pattern in this list
In this list, countries like Russia, Vietnam, and Belarus are included Which have anti-West or anti-US stance somewhere So, did you understand what it means? Iran is trying to catch two birds with one stone The first target of Iran is to grow its country, boost its economy, and create employment there But the second target is to make sure that Iran’s economy is growing and creating employment there Which is arguably more important than that That is, with this move, Iran is trying to end the Iranophobia that is spreading all over the world.
maybe you have heard the term Iranophobia for the first time And its simple meaning is fear of Iran, Iranophobia is prevalent all over the world And it has been a well-thought-out conspiracy by the West somewhere or the other Now, Iranophobia is a trend in the whole world And we will talk about how Iran will counter this strategy So, look at the irony Iranophobia was caused by a 43-year-old mistake of Iran And its poisonous fruit is still suffering today It is a very interesting story.
The Iranian Revolution in Iran
This is from the year 1979 There was an Iranian revolution in Iran In which religious clerics were ruling for many years The king of the Pahlavi dynasty, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was ruling there for many years How can it have even killed God? There was a report that Allah regard the Khomeini as a ruler Who is only a tiny piece of the one Pahlavi But, with this fact being a ruler It became clear that’s there is power of Beyond Being We support such内 takiego So, the thing is that Iran’s north-westhabitude allies are not a timeshake.
because Khomeini’s ideology was very radical, he declared Iran an Islamic Republic as soon as he came to power. Now, on one side, this was happening in Iran, on the other side, King Mohammad Raza Pahlavi ran away and went to the US. Now, this was a turning point in the history of Iran. Because of this, Ayatollah Khomeini and the other Iranian revolutionaries were suddenly angry with the US.
In this anger, the revolutionaries entered the US embassy in Tehran and made 50 Americans hostages. This proved to be the biggest mistake of Iran. Because of Iran’s actions, the US imposed its first economic sanction on Iran in 1979. Due to which, in a blink of an eye, all the countries stopped trading with Iran.
Even after that, many countries and organizations of the US, UK, European Union, and United Nations started to protest. In addition, Iran’s radical religious activities and terrorism imposed more than 25 sanctions on Iran. And because of these actions, Iran’s reputation at the geopolitical level also deteriorated for years.
And these sanctions affected its economic growth in a bad way. Somehow, Iran was just selling its oil in the black market and running its economy. But then, in 2012, the Iranian economy had to face a major blow. The US imposed very strong sanctions on Iran to try to create a nuclear bomb. Because of which, Iran was cut off from the economies of the world in a flash.
As a result, overnight, all the assets of Iran and the funds in foreign banks seized the world. And its major income source, oil export, was also banned. Now, you can see the effect of this ban in the report of the World Bank. Iran’s economy was $600 billion before the sanctions in 2012. But after that, its economy is continuously falling.
And today, it has fallen twice as much as it did before. You won’t see this pattern in any other country. Now, because of these sanctions, Iran’s economy had to face a major blow. But the thing that hit Iran with more impact than that, was the world’s destruction. Iran’s reputation has deteriorated.
After 2012, Iran has been portrayed as the world’s most corrupt, worst governance, and state-sponsored terrorism. Today, Iran has become an authoritarian and corrupt country. Because of this, every country wants to keep a distance from Iran. And that’s why, to counter this destroyed image, the Iranophobia, Iran has taken a very tactful step.
They have tried to target Iran with one arrow and two shots. And this is what Iran’s Deputy Tourism Minister, Ali Asghar Shalbafian, has said himself. He has said that tourism is a good way to counter Iranophobia. To complete this mission, the Iranian government has also allocated a dedicated fund of 103 crores. And the government has given regular orders to its diplomats to promote tourism.
Iran Tourism Policy for Indians
they have a tourism policy that is drowning all their efforts in water. Now look, tourism is a sector where people come to explore the country freely. But in Iran, this is completely the opposite. There are such restrictions on tourists there. Which you might find in some countries in the world.
For example, in Iran, a boy and a girl can’t travel together publicly, hand in hand. Their public transportation systems, like buses, trains, are literally followed by gender segregation. Basically, there, males and females have to travel in compulsorily separate compartments. And there is a bigger restriction than this, that every tourist has to follow the Iranian dress code.
And according to this dress code, females have to wear hijab and loose clothes, which covers the entire body. And males have to wear compulsorily full sleeves and full pants. Now, even after all this, there is another problem. If tourists go there in the month of Ramadan by mistake, then literally, they will have to remain hungry.
Because according to the Sharia law, in Iran, during Ramadan, there is a ban on publicly food selling. And you have to buy food. If a tourist is seen eating in a public place, then according to the Sharia law, he can be jailed. But wait, it doesn’t stop over here. There is more. The next big problem. No debit card, credit cards allowed.
No Debit cards and credit cards in Iran
Because in Iran, payment companies like Visa and Mastercard are banned. So, after all these restrictions, which tourist will want to go to Iran? And that’s why many experts believe that because of these strict public policies, the dream of attracting tourists to Iran is just a dream. And most importantly, the biggest setback for Iran will be that those Indian tourists, who are now called the king of tourism, will be the first ones to be lost.
Why Indian tourists have become so important to the world?
Today, Indian tourists have become so important for the world that the UAE has made the visa on arrival facility available to attract Indians. Whereas, normally, the citizens of other countries have to take the visa before entry. Now, you can understand the importance of Indians for UAE tourism by the fact that the head of their tourism department himself has said that India is the number one tourism market for Dubai.
And forget all these examples. Will you believe that, Indian tourists have saved the economy of many countries from collapse? For example, Maldives. Indians saved Maldives. This is the word of Maldives’ top hospitality and hotel chain, Mercure’s tycoon, Muhammad Ali ji. He said that during the COVID pandemic, Indian tourists have saved the economy of Maldives, Basically, their 40% population works in the Maldives’ tourism sector.
That means, almost half of the country’s employment is dependent on this sector. And official records show that 28% of the GDP of Maldives comes directly from Indian tourists. Plus, 60% of their foreign exchange reserves also comes from this sector. So, now you understand the value of Indian tourism for the whole world.
And why not? How much is the population of Indians? And India is growing and developing. And the standard of living of Indians is also increasing. All these upward trends are understandable to other countries. And because of this, they want to attract Indians to their market. Looking at the importance of Indians, today, many countries are offering Indian tourists such offers.
For example, Jordan has offered Indians that if Indians get a destination wedding in Jordan, then a honeymoon for couples for seven nights is free. The Australian government has started giving visas for Indian tourists online. Whereas normally, you have to go to the consulate for visas. So, definitely, this is not a matter of one country. This is becoming a trend worldwide. The demand for Indian tourists is really increasing.
Why do countries specifically want to attract Indian tourists?
then according to the Center for Monitoring the Indian Economy, in this graph, as you can see, three years ago, Indian tourists’ spending in foreign countries was only $7 billion.
But in just three years, this number has doubled, i.e. $13.7 billion. According to the data of the Indian Times, Indian tourists are one of the highest spenders in the world. In fact, you can understand the impact of Indians’ spending rise by this, according to the report published in The Hindu, last year, 10.
7 million Indians went to India, which made their economy a whopping $28 billion profit. Looking at this profit, the Malaysian government introduced a visa-free policy for Indians this year. Similarly, Thailand also introduced a visa exemption for Indians after seeing a 30% growth in its tourism sector. In fact, so far, 58 countries have changed their visa policy for Indians, just so that they can attract us as tourists to their country.
And now friends, We don’t know what you think about this is a very important soft power of Indians. And our government has made this a very important soft power for the country and how it utilizes and leverages it for the benefit of the country and its citizens, we will find out in the coming time.
But on one hand, where India’s power is growing, on the other hand, some of India’s ties are weakening. Our all-time friend Russia is now opening the doors of BRICS for Pakistan. And the situation has become such that India is forced to leave BRICS. BRICS is such an organization that used to give India a lot of profit, a lot of economic gain, but now India is forced to leave it.
