Noel Rock (Dublin North West, Fine Gael)
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15. To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality regarding the need for biometric information to be submitted in advance of getting a tourist visa for Ireland in certain nations and her plans to make it easier to access, currently it is the case that a person travelling from southern India needs to travel ten or more hours to Mumbai to have their fingerprint and digital photo taken in advance of a visit here. [29417/16]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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India is one of two countries that benefit from the British Irish Visa Scheme which enables short-stay visitors to move freely within the Common Travel Area on a single visa granted by either Ireland or the UK depending on the first port of arrival. This involves certain procedures and processes being carried out including biometric checks for all visa applicants. To facilitate this and to enable visa applicants to lodge their application forms and documents, a total of 12 Visa Application Centres are established across India where applications for both Irish and UK visas can be made and where initial processing of documentation is carried out. I am advised by the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service (INIS) of my Department that there are six such centres in southern India: Pune, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Goa and Cochin in addition to Mumbai further to the north.