There were 102 visits to India by foreign dignitaries including presidents and prime ministers in the last two years, according to details provided by the government in Rajya Sabha on Thursday.
In responding to a question, Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan provided a detailed list of foreign dignitaries who visited India between January 2020 and March 2022.
The presidents who visited India during the period included Portugal's Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa and Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro. The prime ministers on the list included Mette Frederiksen of Denmark and Fumio Kishida of Japan.
To a separate query, Muraleedharan said the government is planning to issue e-passports to its citizens, starting 2022-23, adding it will be a combination of paper and electronic passports. He said the e-passports will be produced by the India Security Press, Nashik, which has issued letters of intent for the procurement of 4.5 crore ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organisation)- compliant electronic chips along with its operating system.
"This (e-passport) will be a combined paper and electronic passport, with an embedded Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) chip and antenna embedded as an inlay in the back cover," he said. "The passport's critical information will be printed on its data page as well as stored in the chip. The characteristics of the document and the chip are specified in International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) document 9303," he added.
Muraleedharan said the external affairs ministry has entrusted National Informatics Centre (NIC) with the technical responsibilities for the e-passport. "The e-passports will be produced by the India Security Press, Nashik, which has issued letters of intent for the procurement of 4.5 crore ICAO-compliant electronic chips along with its operating system," he said. The minister said sample e-passports are currently being tested.
In responding to another question, Minister of State for External Affairs Rajkumar Ranjan Singh said India will hold the G20 presidency from December 1, 2022, to November 30, 2023. He said India will convene the G20 Leaders' Summit for the first time in 2023.
Singh said as the G20 Presidency, India will be in a position to identify and highlight, develop and strengthen international support for priorities of vital importance to developing countries in diverse social and economic sectors. He said programmes and events will be organised to showcase India's diversity and culture and to promote the country as a business and tourism destination.
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