You apply for an India e-Visa yourself, online, before you fly — at the government portal `indianvisaonline.gov.in`, no agent required. The 30-day e-Tourist Visa costs around USD 25 in the July-to-March season, takes most people fifteen minutes to complete, and must be submitted at least four days before departure. Gaya (GAY) is one of the airports approved for e-Visa entry.
That is the whole answer. The rest of this page is the detail that goes wrong: which of the four e-Visa options you want, what the portal rejects photographs for, the separate e-Arrival Card that arrived in October 2025, and what actually happens at the immigration desk in Gaya.
Which e-Visa do you need?
The portal offers e-Tourist Visas in four lengths, and pilgrimage groups routinely buy the wrong one.
- 30 days, double entry. The standard choice for a pilgrimage of a week or two. The fee is seasonal: roughly USD 25 from July to March, and about USD 10 from April to June, when almost nobody travels to Bihar because of the heat.
- One year, multiple entry. About USD 40. Worth it if you expect to return within the year — a monastery group that goes back for Monlam, for example.
- Five years, multiple entry. About USD 80. Sensible for organisers who travel several times a year.
- e-Business, e-Medical and e-Conference visas exist on the same portal and are not what a pilgrim wants.
The 30-day visa runs from the date of arrival, not the date of issue, so applying early costs you nothing. The one-year and five-year versions run from the date of grant, and each individual stay is capped — check the current cap on the portal before you assume a long trip fits.
What do you need before you start?
Have these five things on the desk before you open the form, because the session times out.
- A passport valid for at least six months from your date of arrival, with two blank pages for the stamps.
- A recent photograph, front-facing, plain white background, head square in the frame. This is the single most common cause of a rejected application. It must be a square-ish digital file, not a scan of a printed photo, and not a holiday snap cropped down.
- A scan or clear photograph of the passport bio page, readable, all four corners visible.
- A confirmed return or onward ticket. The portal asks for it, and Indian immigration can ask to see it.
- A debit or credit card for the fee. There is no cash option and no counter to pay at.
You will also be asked for the address of your first night in India and for your parents' names and dates of birth. Pilgrimage organisers should collect these from the group in advance rather than during the application, which is where an afternoon disappears.
How do you apply, step by step?
- Go to `indianvisaonline.gov.in` and choose e-Visa, then e-Tourist Visa. Ignore the sponsored results above it in a search; several look official and charge two or three times the fee to fill in the same form.
- Complete the application. It saves against a temporary application ID, so write that ID down before you go any further.
- Upload the photograph and the passport page.
- Pay the fee by card. Payment is the step that commits the application.
- Wait for the Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) to arrive by email and to show as GRANTED on the portal. Most are granted in two to four working days.
- Print it. Carry the printout with your passport. Airline check-in staff at Suvarnabhumi will ask to see it, and a phone with a flat battery is not a document.
Apply only through `indianvisaonline.gov.in`. No agent is required at any stage, and no legitimate service can make the four-day cut-off shorter.
What does it cost, and when should you apply?
The fee is about USD 25 for the 30-day double-entry visa between July and March, and about USD 10 between April and June. A small card-processing charge is added at payment. Rates are set by the Indian government and are reviewed periodically, so treat these as the figures at the time of publishing and check the portal for your travel dates.
The timing window is firm at both ends:
- No earlier than 120 days before your date of arrival.
- No later than four days before it.
For a group of ten or more, apply three to four weeks out. Not because the visa takes that long, but because in any group of thirty at least one passport is expiring inside six months, one photograph will be rejected, and one person will mistype a date of birth. Four days is enough for one clean application and not enough for a group.
What is the e-Arrival Card?
Since October 2025, travellers to India also submit an e-Arrival Card online — the digital replacement for the paper disembarkation form that used to be handed out on the aircraft. It is free, it is separate from the visa, and it can be submitted up to 72 hours before you land.
Do it the day before you fly, print the confirmation, and put it with the ETA. It takes about three minutes and it is the difference between walking through immigration at Gaya and standing in a side queue filling in a form by hand.
What happens at Gaya on arrival?
Gaya is a small airport and the process is short but not fast.
At immigration your fingerprints and photograph are captured, the ETA is checked against your passport, and the visa is stamped in. The e-Visa is not a stamp you arrive holding; it is an authorisation to be granted one at the border. Keep the printout in your hand rather than in your bag.
Allow 45 minutes to an hour from door to kerb for a full flight. Groups of fifty on a charter-style booking should expect longer, and it is worth agreeing with your guide in advance that the group stays together rather than filtering through in ones and twos.
Bodh Gaya is about 20 minutes by road, roughly 12 km. That means a morning arrival can be at the Mahabodhi Temple the same afternoon, which is worth knowing when you build the programme.
What the e-Visa does not allow
Three limits that matter, and one that catches Buddhist groups in particular.
- It is non-extendable and non-convertible. You cannot turn it into another visa category from inside India.
- It is valid only for entry at designated airports and seaports. Gaya and Kolkata both qualify. Arriving overland from Nepal on an e-Visa does not work.
- It does not admit you to protected or restricted areas, which require a separate permit. Nothing on a Bodh Gaya programme falls inside one, but a group adding Sikkim or parts of the north-east afterwards needs to plan for it.
- Photography and mobile phones are restricted inside the Mahabodhi Temple complex — a temple rule, not a visa rule, but the same trip. Your first visit to Bodh Gaya covers what you can and cannot carry in.
Do monks and children need anything different?
No. There is no monastic or clerical category on the portal, and no concession — an ordained applicant fills in the same e-Tourist Visa form and pays the same fee as everyone else. Where the passport photograph shows robes and a shaved head, use a current photograph rather than an older lay one, because the immigration officer compares the face in front of them with the file.
Children need their own passport and their own e-Visa, at the full fee, however young they are. There is no family application and no shared entry.
Which airport should the group fly into?
Bhutan Airlines serves Gaya (GAY) seasonally on the Airbus A320, and Kolkata (CCU) daily. Both are approved e-Visa entry points, so the visa is the same either way and the decision is purely one of road time.
Gaya puts you 20 minutes from Bodh Gaya. Kolkata is a different trip — roughly 450 km away, with a domestic connection or an overnight train at the end of it. Flying into Kolkata makes sense when you want the city as well, and the first-timer's guide to Kolkata sets out what a couple of days there looks like.
For a pilgrimage that is only about Bodh Gaya, Gaya in season is the shorter day.
Hold your fare while the visa runs
You do not need the visa in hand to hold a fare. Send your dates through Book & Hold and we hold the seats free for 48 hours while you start the applications, then return one written quote.
Group fares on the Bangkok–Gaya route start from THB 15,000 return per person for parties of ten or more, and larger temple communities of 50 to 60 can propose their own dates. Fares are quoted in Thai baht, per person, inclusive of taxes and surcharges at the time of publishing, and start from the figure shown. Fares, seats and availability are confirmed in writing by OMG Experience, the appointed General Sales Agent for Bhutan Airlines in Thailand, before ticketing.
