MUMBAI:In the latest sign of growing prosperity in India’s interiors, nonmetro cities registered at least double the growth in visa applications, compared with metro cities during the first half of this calendar year, according to data compiled by VFS Global, the world’s largest visa services provider.Between January and June, there was a 40% increase in application count from tier-2 cities and smaller metros such as Jalandhar, Pune, Ahmedabad and Chandigarh, according to VFS data shared exclusively with ET. In comparison, the likes of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bengaluru saw an increase of 21%.The double growth percentage was not a result of a lower base in smaller cities, clarified VFS. The four cities recorded up to a million visa applications on average — in the same range as metros.Applications in smaller cities such as Trivandrum and Goa which had counts of below 10,000 grew up to 100%.VFS didn’t give a city-wise breakup, or absolute numbers, but said it received 2.5 million visa applications overall in the first half of 2018: 15% of that was from tier-2 cities. The growth comparison was for short-stay visas.VFS Global manages visa application in 139 countries for 60 client governments worldwide. In India, it processes visas for travel to 45 countries. It handled close to 5 million applications in 2017. The company operates full-fledged visa application centres in 17 Indian cities, besides managing temporary centres and providing on-demand (mobile) services across almost all cities in India.“It is clear the appetite for foreign travel in smaller metros and tier-2 cities in India has grown. Strong disposable incomes coupled with a keen desire to explore new countries/destinations are hallmarks of the modern Indian traveller, and it is heartening to see this trend across many of India’s cities,” Vinay Malhotra, regional group chief operating officer at VFS Global, told ET.Rising wealth, a growing middle class and an overall growth in south Asia’s third largest economy have manifested themselves most significantly in growth in its air traffic, local and international. The number of international flyers in and out of India last year grew 11.3% to 59 million. The top six destinations for which visa applications were processed included the US, Malaysia, the UK, Schengen group of countries, Canada and China, indicating a mix of business, education and leisure travel.Traffic from tier-2 and tier-3 cities is projected to drive outbound international traffic from India, especially in the leisure segment. According to a report by Sydney-based consultant CAPACentre for Aviation and global travel company Expedia earlier this year, leisure international traffic from India will almost treble to 13.9 million passengers in 2025 from about 5 million in 2017, with a major contribution from smaller cities and primarily as a result of capacity growth in overseas routes by its international carriers. Go Air on Thursday became India’s carrier to start international operations announcing flights to Phuket, Thailand and Male, Maldives.For cities such as Kanpur, where VFS doesn’t have application centres, people grouped up and paid premiums to avail of mobile services or the ‘visa at your doorstep service.’“There is a greater comfort with the visa application process too,” said Malhotra. “Applicants from smaller cities are increasingly keen to benefit from services such as ‘Visa At Your Doorstep’ as not only does it offer extreme convenience but also eliminates other expenses that would need to be incurred to travel to cities where we have visa application centres. We typically do not face any issues in documentation collection from applicants in smaller cities.”