Royal Norwegian Embassy in New Delhi

Indian-resident applicants for a Schengen visa to Norway — tourism, family visits, business travel, conference and cultural visits — file through the Norway Visa Application Centres operated by VFS Global, with biometric capture across the eleven Indian centres. Decisioning happens at the Royal Norwegian Embassy at 50-C Shantipath in the Chanakyapuri diplomatic enclave. The Embassy is also the regional decisioning post for Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan — applicants in those countries route their VFS intake locally with files arriving at New Delhi for final decision. The Embassy houses the chancery, the consular section for Norwegian nationals in India and accredited countries, and the migration section handling long-stay Norwegian residence-permit pipeline filed through UDI (Utlendingsdirektoratet, the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration). Work permits for Indian IT professionals taking posts in Norway, ICT-permit inter-company transfers, EU/EEA residence cases for spouses, student permits for Indian degree-seekers at Norwegian universities (NTNU Trondheim is particularly popular among Indian master's students in engineering and technology, alongside the University of Oslo, the University of Bergen and BI Norwegian Business School), family-reunification permits and entrepreneur permits all route through the embassy's migration section. The bilateral context: Norway-India relations are anchored on maritime cooperation (Norway's substantial maritime sector — DNV, Wilhelmsen, Höegh, Klaveness, Stolt-Nielsen — has long-standing Indian operations, particularly in Mumbai and the western Indian shipping corridor), oil and gas cooperation (Equinor has Indian upstream and downstream operations, with ONGC and Reliance as long-term partners), renewable energy (Statkraft's Indian hydropower and solar operations are among the larger Norwegian renewable investments in Asia), seafood (Norway is one of the major suppliers of seafood to the Indian premium-restaurant and hotel market), telecommunications and the substantial Norwegian-Indian academic-research cooperation through the Indo-Norwegian Cooperation Programme. The Indian-origin community in Norway numbers around 30,000 to 40,000 — substantial growth since the 2000s through IT employment, EU/EEA residence permits and family routes, concentrated in Oslo (largest cluster), Bergen, Trondheim and Stavanger. Travel from Norway to India for tourism, yoga and ayurveda retreats, Buddhist pilgrimage (Sikkim, Ladakh, Bodhgaya) and trekking in the Himalayas (the substantial Norwegian Himalaya-trekking community has strong ties to the Indian and Nepalese mountaineering networks) runs almost entirely through India's e-Visa programme without embassy contact.

The Consular Section serves the Norwegian national community in India — registered Norwegian residents number in the high hundreds to low thousands, concentrated in Mumbai (the Norwegian maritime-and-shipping community plus the Equinor and Statkraft operational staff), Delhi NCR (diplomatic and Indo-Norwegian Cooperation Programme staff), Bengaluru (Norwegian IT-services and engineering professionals at Indian operations of Norwegian companies), and the smaller communities in Pune and Chennai. The full Norwegian consular pipeline runs from New Delhi: passport renewal and biometric passport issuance (the embassy is an issuing post on the Norwegian passport network), Norwegian national ID-card issuance, civil-status notification to Skatteetaten of births and marriages abroad, voter registration for Norwegian parliamentary and local elections (the embassy is a Norwegian overseas polling station during election windows), notarial certifications, apostille issuance for Norwegian-issued documents to be used in India under the Hague Apostille Convention, and emergency consular assistance for Norwegian nationals in detention, hospitalisation, victims of crime, repatriation or bereavement. For inbound Norwegian travel into the region — tourism, yoga and ayurveda retreats, trekking and mountaineering in the Indian Himalayas (Sikkim, Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand) and Nepal, Buddhist pilgrimage circuit (Bodhgaya, Sarnath, Kushinagar) and the substantial Norwegian volunteer-and-NGO community working with Indian and Nepalese partners — the embassy's consular monitoring extends to Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan by accreditation. Out-of-hours emergencies anywhere in the consular district route through the UD Crisis Response Unit in Oslo on +47 23 95 00 00, which coordinates with the New Delhi embassy for in-country action.

Norwegian foreign direct investment in India runs across the maritime, energy and renewables sectors. Statkraft's substantial Indian hydropower and solar portfolio is one of the largest Norwegian green-energy positions in Asia; Equinor's Indian upstream and downstream cooperation with ONGC and Reliance covers exploration and production; Yara's Indian fertiliser operations are among the largest Yara global positions; DNV's Indian classification, certification and advisory operations cover the maritime, oil-and-gas and renewable-energy sectors; and the substantial Norwegian shipowner presence in Mumbai (Wilhelmsen, Höegh, Klaveness, Stolt-Nielsen) reflects long-standing Indo-Norwegian maritime ties. The Embassy supports Norwegian investors looking at greenfield or brownfield expansion in India — coordinating with Invest India, state-level investment promotion agencies, and the Indian government's Make in India and PLI (Production Linked Incentive) schemes. Indian outbound FDI into Norway has grown substantially since the mid-2000s, concentrated on the Indian IT-services majors' Norwegian delivery centres (TCS, Infosys, Wipro, HCL, Tech Mahindra all have substantial Norwegian operations), Indian pharmaceutical-and-generics groups establishing Norwegian marketing and regulatory operations, and the occasional larger industrial acquisition in the Norwegian maritime and offshore services chain. The Embassy's investment promotion work includes coordinating the bilateral CEO Forum and the Indo-Norwegian Joint Working Group on renewable energy and climate cooperation, plus joint research programmes through Vinnova-equivalent Norwegian counterparts.

Cultural and educational programming runs through Norway's Embassy Cultural Section, the substantial Norwegian-Indian academic-research partnerships through the Research Council of Norway and the Indian Department of Science and Technology, and the Indo-Norwegian Cooperation Programme. Educational mobility is anchored on Indian students at Norwegian universities (NTNU Trondheim is particularly popular among Indian master's students in engineering and technology; the University of Oslo, University of Bergen, BI Norwegian Business School and the Norwegian School of Economics also draw substantial Indian cohorts), with the QUEST programme and joint Norwegian-Indian research partnerships supporting the academic flow. The Embassy hosts the Norwegian Constitution Day reception on 17 May and supports Norwegian artistic programming in Delhi and Mumbai cultural venues. The substantial Norwegian-Indian musical-and-literary exchange (Norway's small publishing market hosts a strong Indian-English-language readership, and the Indian classical-music institutions have long-standing exchanges with Norwegian conservatories) supports the cultural programming. Norway's diplomatic-cultural focus in India includes climate cooperation, gender equality programming, peace-mediation expertise (Norway's tradition of peace mediation has historical engagement with South Asian conflicts) and the Indo-Norwegian Cooperation Programme.

Schengen short-stay visa appointments are booked through the VFS Global Norway India portal. Long-stay residence-permit applications are filed online through the UDI (Utlendingsdirektoratet) portal, with biometric capture booked through the same VFS network or directly at the embassy depending on category. Norwegian passport, ID-card, civil-status and consular appointments are booked through the embassy's online booking system on the Norway in India portal. Phone enquiries route through the switchboard +91 11 4136 3200 during office hours (Monday to Thursday 08:30–16:30, Friday 08:30–14:00). Visa enquiries: visum.new.delhi@mfa.no. Consular enquiries: consular.new.delhi@mfa.no. General enquiries: emb.newdelhi@mfa.no. The VFS Norway India helpline is +91 22 6786 6021 (info.norwayin@vfshelpline.com). Out-of-hours emergencies route through the UD Crisis Response Unit in Oslo on +47 23 95 00 00, available 24 hours.