Visa Application Centres (VACs) run by VFS Global and Global Visa Centre World have announced one-day closures on Monday, 14 September, to mark Ganesh Chaturthi. Centres handling Schengen, UK and other popular applications in Mumbai’s Bandra-Kurla Complex, Pune and Bangalore will remain shut, with limited staff available only for biometric-collection emergencies. Although the public holiday is regional, many corporate travellers use the Mumbai hub for last-minute Schengen or UK visas. Applicants with biometric or document-drop appointments this week have been auto-rescheduled, and courier dispatch of stamped passports will slide by one business day. Travel managers moving employees to Europe for trade fairs later in the month should factor in the lost processing day and, where possible, shift appointments to Delhi, Chennai or Hyderabad centres that remain open. The closures are also a reminder that India’s decentralised holiday calendar can choke visa-supply chains at short notice; corporates with critical timelines may want to pay for premium walk-in slots or opt for mission direct-submission where available.
Source: VFS Global service alerts
