What permits your 4x4 needs to drive into Arunachal Pradesh

If you are driving your own 4x4 from Assam into Arunachal Pradesh, the permit you need is an Inner Line Permit, and you need one for every Indian adult in the vehicle. You apply on the state's own portal at eilp.arunachal.gov.in. The official fee page states the revised Tourist eILP fee as ₹300 for up to three days and ₹500 for beyond three days up to 14 days. The fee, once paid, is not refundable, so fix your dates before you pay.

The important detail for owners is that the ILP is a document about a person, not about a vehicle. The portal's document list asks for a photograph and a scan of a personal identity document, driving licence, passport, ration card, voter ID, Aadhaar or Permanent Resident Certificate. It does not ask for your RC or insurance. So there is no ILP for the Thar itself. Carry the car's papers anyway, because vehicles are checked at the gates like anywhere else in India.

Doing the application properly

The portal is fussy about files, and a rejected upload at 11pm the night before a drive is a real problem. The photograph must be 35mm by 45mm, between 20KB and 50KB, in jpg or jpeg, and not older than two months. The identity document scan must be between 20KB and 200KB. Documents have to be in English or Hindi. For anyone 18 or under, the parent or guardian's documents are needed as well. Tourist eILP is for Indian citizens only. Foreign nationals in your group cannot use it and have to go the PAP or RAP route instead, which the official page points to the FRRO website for.

Staying longer, and crossing more districts

Fourteen days is not much if you are driving to Mechuka or Anini and back. For a longer stay there is the provisional or temporary ILP, which the portal lists as valid for 15, 30 or 60 days, and can be applied for individually or as a group. The regular ILP runs 365 days and is for a single applicant only. The fee table on the same page shows ₹100 for tourist, student, business, labour and NGO categories, for either one district or multiple districts, with government employees exempt.

That one district or multiple districts choice is the line most convoys get wrong. An Arunachal route rarely sits inside one district. Pick the multi-district option and list every district on your route before you submit.

What changed in 2026, and why it matters at the gate

The state cabinet cleared the ILP Guidelines 2026 in May, moving to a fully digital e-ILP with QR code verification, Aadhaar based authentication and police verification in specified cases, as reported by the Arunachal Times. The Northeast Post's account of the same decision adds district task forces, surprise checks at gates, markets and worksites, and re-entry restrictions of up to two years for violators.

In practice, that means your permit is now a code that gets scanned, and the scan is the record of your entry. Keep a printout and an offline copy on your phone, because the gates sit in places where data is unreliable. Have every passenger's permit ready, not just the driver's.

One last thing worth saying plainly. An ILP lets you be in the state. It is not permission to leave the road. Arunachal's river beds, forest tracks and border approaches are not open ground, and a permit will not help you if you are pulled up for driving where you should not be. Stay on the road, ask locally, and turn around when told to.

Sources

• Apply for Tourist eILP, Government of Arunachal Pradesh
• ILP information and fee table, eILP Arunachal Pradesh
• Cabinet approves anti-paper leak rules, ILP reforms, austerity measures, Arunachal Times
• Arunachal Cabinet approves stricter ILP rules with QR-based e-permits, The Northeast Post