Immigration Minister Marc Miller stated yesterday at a meeting of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration (CIMM) that the department will only be able to process 20,000 of the 38,000 Indian visas that Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) was expecting to process by December.
According to him, just five IRCC personnel are left who can perform the necessary on-the-ground job in India to handle applications. According to the IRCC, this will lead to slower
overall processing timeframes answering questions obtaining the return of passports or visas
The IRCC currently projects that by the start of 2024, there would be about 17,500 Indian applications pending.
Eighty percent of applications are to be processed by the department within service standards. These requirements change based on the kind of application. When an application is not handled in accordance with service requirements, it is backlogged.
For instance, an application for a family-class sponsorship should be handled within 12 months, an Express Entry application should be processed within six months, and an international student visa from outside of Canada should be processed within 60 days.
In-person services are momentarily discontinued.
The Indian Red Cross (IRCC) reports that while all in-person services at Indian consulates have been temporarily suspended till further notice, applications from India will still be accepted and processed. There are some application needs that must be fulfilled locally or in a secure setting on-site.
The 41 Canadian diplomats who were expelled are the reason for the personnel decrease that led to the halt.
The five IRCC employees who are still in India will concentrate on tasks that must be completed domestically. This covers expedited processing, printing of visas, risk assessment, and managing important partners, such as clinics that conduct immigration medical exams, panel physicians, and visa application facilities.
By 2024, the Indian visa application procedure should normalize, according to the IRCC.
By early 2024, senior IRCC officials believe, the government is trying to get back to processing Indian applications normally. The 22 immigration employees who were removed from India, according to the government, will return to their jobs in the Philippines and Canada.
The government noted in an IRCC statement about the staff decrease that 89% of Indian applications are processed through the global network, and that the vast majority of Indian applications are already handled outside of India.
Diplomatic concerns
Regarding the June killing of a well-known Sikh leader in Surrey, British Columbia, Canada and India are now resolving a diplomatic dispute.
Speaking on the subject in September, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated that there is reliable evidence proving the involvement of Indian government operatives in the murder. This is categorically denied by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
India has since asked for Canada to withdraw 41 of its diplomats from India and has temporarily stopped its visa processing operations in Canada.
