France has begun to receive and process applications for select visas for Indian students, researchers and teachers for courses commencing in France in autumn 2020. The visa facilitation centres in seven cities commenced operations on August 17. France is the first country to open its borders to Indian students for the coming academic year in fall.
French ambassador to India Emmanuel Lenain said that France was returning to normalcy. “I am delighted that international students will be among the first to benefit from it. The French embassy is fully mobilised to ensure that students can pursue their studies in France in the smoothest conditions possible, despite the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a bold step in the right direction and reaffirms France's priority to academic mobility.”
The opening up is in phases, and for the present, the facility is only available for Indian students travelling to France in autumn 2020 for study programmes longer than three months (on long-term visas) as well as short-term studies or internships, with accommodation in France. It also includes professors or researchers employed or invited by a French academic institution or laboratory, who are travelling at the end of their studies, or for teaching. The facility is also open for those with a Talent passport.
France is keen to get back to normalcy, even as cases of COVID-19 are rising again, in some places to pre-lockdown highs. The French government declared Paris and Marseilles as high-risk zones last week, making masks compulsory and initiating a slew of other curbs to keep the infection from spreading. British authorities last week re-imposed a 14-day quarantine on all travellers returning from France. The move came as a big blow to France, specially its tourism industry, which was making some recoveries in the summer.
According to the French embassy, in 2019, around 10,000 Indian students opted to study in France. The targets of 10,000 students each in both countries was a goal that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emanuel Macron had agreed to work towards.
The bulk of Indian students, however, head to the US and UK. The US hosts around 2 lakh Indian students, while the UK hosts around 21,000 Indian students. The UK recently announced concessions for post-study visas for students whose travel has been impacted by the pandemic. The US had earlier decided to cancel visas of those students whose courses had gone completely online, which would even make staying back in the US a crime for those students who have not returned. It later rolled back the order.
