What is Apostille attestation ?
Apostille attestation is a process of authenticating the
documents which are intend to be used in country other than the origin of
document from where the document has been issued. For example: If your birth
certificate is issued from any state in India and this certificate is required
by Immigration, University or any department in country other than India then
it should be attested by the competent authority in India and then only it will
be accepted as a authenticated document.
In earlier days, this process of authentication of document
was very slow , time consuming and costly because before Apostille convention
the legalization process was in place to authenticate the document in order to
be accepted by foreign country as a genuine and valid document. Legalization is
a process where several individual authentications are required to be done
firstly by the officials from the country where the document has been issued and lately
by the Embassy or consulate of the country where documents is to be submitted
and this was the reason that Legalization process was slow and time consuming.
In order to replace the process of Legalization with any
fast process, a convention between 100’s of countries was organized in the year
1961 which is called “ Hague convention of 5th October 1961”. In
order to simplify the process of authentication one treaty was signed between
several countries accepting the Apostille convention a process to authenticate
public documents to be used abroad. Now in the countries where Hague convention
is applicable, the process of authenticating the document is cut short to a
single formality whereby candidate can get authentication done by an authority
appointed by the government of the country where document is issued.
Apostille attestation is a kind of certificate which is
pasted on the back side of the document and is sealed and signed by the
authorized signatory of the competent authority. From last many years Apostille
attestation has proven to be extremely useful and is applied on millions of
documents among the countries where both the countries are part of Hague
Convention.
Do I need apostille
attestation to be done on my documents?
If you are an individual applying for Education or Student
visa, Residency visa, Job or Employment Visa, Dependent visa, Long term visa, want to setup an office or
company abroad and export of goods abroad you may be required to get your
Personal, Educational and Commercial documents authenticated by Ministry of
External affairs by putting apostille sticker on your document. But it depends
on various factors and requirements of different countries. So, its better to
have look on below points to understand if you require apostille attestation or
not:
If all 4 points below apply in your case then you are
required to get apostille attestation:
1)
Check if the country from where your document
has been issued is a party to Hague Convention or not. Because only if your
country is a party to Hague convention than only Apostille attestation is
required and valid.
2)
Check if the country where you want to submit
these documents is part of Hague convention or not. Because only if the country
where you have to submit your document is a party to Hague convention than only
Apostille attestation is required and valid.
3)
Check if law of your country where document has
been issued considers your document as a public document.
4)
Check if the country where you have to submit
your document requires apostille attestation in order to consider it as an
authenticated foreign public document.
But it is always better to check and confirm with the
recipient authority to know if they require apostille attestation of your
documents or not. Because it might be the case, that the country where document
is to be used has abolished or simplify the need of Apostille attestation.
Also, be informed that apostille attestation is generally or never required to
authenticate the document in same country where it has been issued.
What is the
alternative of apostille attestation?
In case if you are applying for a country which is not
member of Hague conference or a party to Apostille convention or your own
country from where your document has been issued is not member of Hague
conference or a party to Apostille convention then you should check with the Embassy or consulate of the country you are applying to for appropriate information.
Which is the competent
authority in India to do Apostille Attestation?
Government of India has appointed Ministry of External
affair as a competent authority to authenticate the public documents by issuing
apostille certificate. Ministry of External affairs Delhi is authorized to do
apostille attestation for the documents issued in India and are to be used
abroad. Contact details of Ministry of External Affair, Delhi is as follows:
Ministry of External Affairs
Kasturba Gandhi Marg, 1688 Barracks,
New Delhi-110001
