Hello people,
Background:
I am an Indian by nationality and living in Germany for past 4 years. My girl friend is German by nationality and we will be having our first child together in April 2007. We plan to get married in Germany in June 2007.

Questions:
1.Would it be required for me to get a new passport with the spouse and child's information on it? Did someone already face this situation and could suggest how to do this.
2.Would our child have German or Indian or both nationalities? If it can't be dual nationality then can the parents select which nationality a child would be having? If we decide that our child gets German nationality, then is there a PIO card for children because mother/father is an Indian?
3.Assuming that my wife retains her German passport in the future after our wedding, would she always need an Indian Visa to travel to India even after she is married to an Indian (in this case me)?

Would be grateful if someone could answer all or some part of the questions I raised.
Thanks in advance,
Cheers, Gnomon.

Question 1 .

You can call the Indian Embassy and get the details
http://www.indischebotschaft.de/German/ghomepge.htm
I am not aware of the procedure

Question 2.

Your child is eligible for German and Indian Nationality. He can choose himself when he reaches 18. (Good thing because the child wont blame you for choosing the wrong one for him later). Yes you and your child can apply for the PIO Card for visa free travel even if you both have German Nationality.

Question 3.

Yes. What makes you think getting married to a Indian will excempt a foreigner from this obligation? She has to take a Indian visa to travel to india. But it should be a piece of cake.

Just a small correction..

"Your child is eligible for German and Indian Nationality. He can choose himself when he reaches 18"

This is true only if both parents are foreigners living in Germany. If one of the parents is German at the time of the birth, the child gets the German citizenship forever.(
jus sanguinis
Citizenship transfer by blood ) The child does not have to decide for one citizenship or the other. If he gets the Indian citizenship at the time of the birth, than German one is not effected from this one. The child can lose the German citizenship only if he/she decides to take a citizenship sometime in future other than the ones which he gained at the time of the birth.

More info here:
http://www.info4alien.de/einbuergerung/themen/kinder.htm

Wenn ein Elternteil eines Kindes die deutsche Staatsangehörigkeit besitzt, ist das Kind automatisch deutscher Staatsangehöriger, auch wenn ein anderer Elternteil eine andere Staatsangehörigkeit hat. Unerheblich dabei ist auch der Geburtsort. Entgegen einer verbreiteten Meinung müssen diese Kinder sich auch nicht irgendwann entscheiden, ob sie eine der Staatsangehörigkeiten abgeben. Jedenfalls verlangt das nicht der deutsche Staat. In der Regel dürften die Kinder auch die Staatsangehörigkeit des anderen Elternteiles besitzen. Das richtet sich aber nach dem Staatsangehörigkeitsrecht des jeweiligen Staates

Regards,

Lacrima

PS: The only problem I see here is that the parents of the child will not be married at the time of the birth. I am not sure whether this can effect the gain of the Indian citizenship, as I dont have a clue about the Indian Nationality law, I can not really comment on this.

@lacrima,

Thanks for the clarification. I had that opinion because India does not allow dual citizenship with Germany.

@gnomon

Have to take back my answer for question 1. Since it is little complicated better ask the consulate people personally after explaining your situation.

My personal opinion is get a german passport for yourself and apply for OIC. For your wife and kid visas should not be a problem

Here is the link for OIC

http://www.mha.nic.in/oci/oci-main.htm

Thanks people for your answers.

@raj
Thanks for your suggestion.

As suggested, I called the Indische Botschaft in Frankfurt & a they told I would need to apply for new passport with my Child's details and spouse's name.

A Child born from One German and one Foreign parent in Germany, and who are not married, will by default have the German Citizenship. I did the Vaterschaftserklärung already, so that our child could get my last name at the time of birth, else its also by default the last name of the mother.

By doing a so called Sorgerechterklärung, I could take a decision together with my partner whether our child should get Indian or German Citizenship (no dual citizenship here) and we decided for German citizenship for our child :-)

Cheers, Gnomon