India Inc welcomes UK move to scrap visa bond scheme

Welcoming the UK government's move to scrap the controversial 3,000-pound visa bond scheme, India Inc on Tuesday said this would further help in boosting trade and investments between the countries.

The Indian industry chambers' response came after the UK officially announced its decision to scrap the controversial 3,000-pound visa bond scheme for some "high risk" overseas visitors to the UK including those from India which was scheduled to be implemented on a pilot scale this month.

"It is indeed a welcome development and has come as a relief to Indian companies who have been actively eyeing the UK market to invest and to do business with," Ficci said in a statement.

It said that the UK government has positively considered the apprehensions raised by domestic industry on the issue.

Sharing similar views, CII said: "The decision of UK government is good for trade between the two countries".

It said that it was also good news for Indian students as well as the UK universities that had seen a drop of 25 per cent registrations from India alone in the last one year on account of rise in tuition fees and growing visa restrictions.

"The scrapping of the idea of pilot scheme is a welcome relief even for the tourists and families travelling to UK each year and at the same time for the UK tourism industry, which would have felt the brunt had the scheme got under way," it added.

The UK gets 3,39,000 visitors from India each year. The bilateral trade between the countries stood at $15 billion in 2012-13.