From 1 June 2026, international passengers connecting through Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad must use DigiYatra—India’s facial-recognition boarding system—to clear transit security. Announced by the Ministry of Civil Aviation as a ‘hub-and-spoke’ pilot, the move marks the first time DigiYatra is obligatory rather than voluntary. Under the new scheme, travellers upload an Aadhaar-verified selfie and their boarding passes to the DigiYatra app at least 48 hours before departure. On arrival at one of the four hubs, cameras at e-gates match the live image with the encrypted template stored in the DigiYatra cloud, opening access to the international-transfer corridor without the need to rescan a paper boarding pass. The Airports Authority of India estimates the biometric lane trims 12–18 minutes from typical transit times at Delhi’s Terminal 3.
![DigiYatra Biometric Transit Made Mandatory at Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad Airports]()
Travelers looking to align their documents with these new biometric procedures can streamline the process through VisaHQ. The company’s India portal (https://www.visahq.com/india/) consolidates e-Visa applications, business-visa renewals and other consular services in one place, offering live status updates that make it easier to synchronise DigiYatra enrollment with up-to-date travel paperwork.
Airlines are adjusting processes in parallel. IndiGo, Air India and Vistara have updated pre-departure emails to highlight the mandatory registration, while global carriers such as Emirates and Lufthansa have issued operational bulletins to ground staff. Failure to enrol now triggers a manual exception flow involving secondary screening and potential mis-connects—a key risk for tight 90-minute domestic-to-international connections. Privacy campaigners, led by the Internet Freedom Foundation, argue the mandatory rollout lacks a statutory data-protection framework. In response, the Ministry reiterated that facial templates are deleted within 24 hours of flight departure and that the programme is governed by the 2025 Digital Personal Data Protection Act. A formal audit mechanism, including surprise penetration tests, will be published later this year. For corporate travel managers the immediate action item is traveller education. Firms should embed DigiYatra registration into pre-trip approval workflows and update travel-policy language around acceptable mobile apps. Multinationals running group moves should schedule on-site enrolment drives, as VPN-restricted corporate phones may block the app. While the pilot currently applies only to four hubs, the ministry’s roadmap targets nationwide coverage by 2027, signaling that biometric ID is set to become the default gateway for all international transfers in India.
Travelers looking to align their documents with these new biometric procedures can streamline the process through VisaHQ. The company’s India portal (https://www.visahq.com/india/) consolidates e-Visa applications, business-visa renewals and other consular services in one place, offering live status updates that make it easier to synchronise DigiYatra enrollment with up-to-date travel paperwork.
Airlines are adjusting processes in parallel. IndiGo, Air India and Vistara have updated pre-departure emails to highlight the mandatory registration, while global carriers such as Emirates and Lufthansa have issued operational bulletins to ground staff. Failure to enrol now triggers a manual exception flow involving secondary screening and potential mis-connects—a key risk for tight 90-minute domestic-to-international connections. Privacy campaigners, led by the Internet Freedom Foundation, argue the mandatory rollout lacks a statutory data-protection framework. In response, the Ministry reiterated that facial templates are deleted within 24 hours of flight departure and that the programme is governed by the 2025 Digital Personal Data Protection Act. A formal audit mechanism, including surprise penetration tests, will be published later this year. For corporate travel managers the immediate action item is traveller education. Firms should embed DigiYatra registration into pre-trip approval workflows and update travel-policy language around acceptable mobile apps. Multinationals running group moves should schedule on-site enrolment drives, as VPN-restricted corporate phones may block the app. While the pilot currently applies only to four hubs, the ministry’s roadmap targets nationwide coverage by 2027, signaling that biometric ID is set to become the default gateway for all international transfers in India.
