Marriage and documents

Getting married in India or the Netherlands, and legalising Indian documents.

A marriage validly concluded in India is in principle recognised in the Netherlands. If you live in the Netherlands, you are required to register the marriage with your municipality. For that you need the Indian marriage certificate bearing an apostille.

The same applies to birth certificates, diplomas and other Indian documents you want to use in the Netherlands: they must be apostilled in India by the Ministry of External Affairs. The Dutch government describes exactly which steps are needed for each type of document.

Useful links

• Netherlands Worldwide – Legalising documents from India netherlandsworldwide.nl
  Step-by-step guide per document.
• Same guide in Dutch nederlandwereldwijd.nl
  Step-by-step guide per document (Dutch).
• Government of the Netherlands – Marriage (Dutch) rijksoverheid.nl
  Marrying abroad and registration in the Netherlands.
• MEA – Apostille mea.gov.in
  India's Ministry of External Affairs on apostilles.