India became a member of the Hague Apostille Convention on October 26, 2004, and the agreement officially took effect on July 14, 2005. Since then, apostille-certified documents from India have been legally accepted in over 120 participating countries without requiring additional authentication, such as consular legalization.

An apostille is an internationally recognized certificate that verifies the authenticity of official documents, including birth and marriage certificates, death records, court orders, company documents, and notarial acts. This certification confirms both the signature validity and the authority of the issuing official.

However, countries outside the Hague Convention do not recognize apostilles. In such cases, an alternative consular legalization process is required to validate Indian documents for international use.