Portuguese Nationality for Goans

As explained before, Goans are fooled by agents of all types within Goa who claim to have complete know-how of claiming the Portuguese nationality for Goans which is the much sought after desire of Goans in recent times.

This post is an attempt to guide Goans on the simple procedure to follow while aspiring to claim Portuguese nationality.

Firstly please note that you are merely not in pursuit of the Portuguese passport. You need to claim the Portuguese nationality which has already been granted to all Goans. All that you are doing now is presenting papers and documents of the Portuguese era to claim for that nationality since Portugal asserts that it is not in possession of olden records which can prove that you are a Portuguese national by birth. We are not acquiring fresh citizenship of Portugal.

For all those born before 1961, are simply registering themselves in Portugal which is the official declaration that they wish to remain Portuguese citizens, a facility which came our way due to the alteration made in the Portuguese nationality law in 1975, wherein people from Goa were assumed to be Portuguese citizens.

The first thing to do is apply for the appointment to present your papers in the consulate in Goa. the address of the Portuguese consulate is:
Parwati House No 38/39, Fr Agnelo Road, Altinho, Goa - 403001

The telephone numbers of the Portuguese Consulate in Goa are

0832 - 2421524, 2421525, 2224004, 2229266.

( Please do not call in the mornings since the staff is naturally busy with consulate work attending to the public. Better time to call is in the evenings between 4 pm to 4.45 pm. However if you get a negative reply or even an irritated reply, be patient and call the next day. Remember the staff of the consulate is as human as you and me and can get exhausted with a hard days monotonous work . So be patient and learn to pursue your query patiently)

However, currently the Portuguese consulate in Goa does not accept physical applications for appointment directly. Instead you need to apply for it through their website. Also, earlier one could easily book appointments on their website directly, take a printout of it and then go to the consulate on the appointed date. In recent months the procedure has been modified, which means that now you need to send them an email with the details of your name, address, telephone number, Indian passport number and the date of birth. After receiving your email, the office of the consulate will send you a reply with the appointment date.

Applications for appointment for nationality have to be made at the following email address : app.nationality@goa.dgaccp.pt. The official website of the Portuguese consulate in Goa is www(dot)consuladoportugalgoa(dot)com. You need to click on English version to get the website in English. If you click on "Appointments" you will get the page which has the above email address.

After you get your appointment, you need to prepare your documentation. However do not prepare your documents months in advance as the documents have a validity ( as per the consulate regulations) after being attested by various authorities. This validity varies from 6 months to one year for different documents.

So the best thing would be to start preparing the documents around a month in advance of the appointment date. The documentation required for Goans born before 1961 is explained here. Also the documentation required for Goans born after 1961 is enlisted here.

You also need to have an original document of the Portuguese era. The type of original document you need to have is explained here.

In my next post on the Portuguese passport, I will explain the procedure for preparing the documentation.