UPSC Essentials | Issue at a glance: Rush to study abroad

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Higher Education has been in news for multiple reasons — be it Indians studying abroad or foreign universities in India. The recent statement by Ministry of External Affairs in Rajya Sabha on Indians studying abroad should also be read in connection with foreign universities in India, NEP etc.

Relevance: Education is an important topics in GS Paper 2 of UPSC CSE. Recent developments especially in higher education sector becomes more relevant with ongoing discussions on NEP. Aspirants should not ignore the dreams of students who want top class education. We go Beyond the Issue to read an inspirational case study by Deeksha Teri which aspirants will find relevant as anecdotes for essays or ethics. Also, Milind Sohoni helps to ponder on why Indians go abroad to study and Daksh Panwar  reports on the Canada migration racket. Finally, Sourav Roy Barman answers: What are the regulations announced for foreign universities in India?

Why in news?

Indians now study in 240 countries around the world, the Ministry of External Affairs informed Rajya Sabha last month. Canada, Australia, the UK, and the US remain the top choices, but sizable numbers are also travelling to Uzbekistan, Philippines, Russia, Ireland, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan.

At the same time, Indian students also got a shocking news that some 700 Indian students are facing deportation from Canada after “admission offer letters” provided by a Jalandhar-based immigration agency were established as fake. As more and more Indian students are opting to study abroad, many are falling prey to unscrupulous agents.

Divya A Explains:

The numbers students going abroad have only risen after the pandemic, the data suggest. Indians going abroad for higher education touched a six-year high in 2022 at over 7.5 lakh, the Education Ministry told Parliament last month. India surpassed China to become the country with the most international students in the US in 2022.

Rising steadily

Number of Indians on a study visa abroad has been increasing for the past few years, barring the pandemic years. The number of Indians choosing to study abroad rose from 4.5 lakh in 2017 to 5.2 lakh in 2018 to around 5.86 lakh in 2019, as per government data. The pandemic, however, resulted in this number crashing to 2.6 lakh in 2020.

Countries of choice

THE UK: Britain granted 1.4 lakh sponsored study visas to Indians in 2022, a major increase from the 34,261 visas in 2019, as per statistics available on the UK government website. The second largest group to be given sponsored study visas by the UK in 2022 was of Chinese students. In September 2019, the UK announced a post-study work visa called the “graduate route”, which allowed international students, including those from India, to work, or look for work, in any career or position for two years after successfully completing their studies.

CANADA: As of 2019, there were over 2.2 lakh Indian study permit holders in Canada, constituting 34 per cent of Canada’s foreign student population. In 2021, as Canada placed a travel ban owing to the pandemic, many Indian students, especially from Punjab, sought to travel to the country through Russia, Serbia, Qatar, and Dubai. The fact that Australia and New Zealand closed their borders to international students in 2021 also contributed to the surge in Indian student migration to Canada, experts in the immigration business said.

UKRAINE, CHINA: The Russian invasion plunged the future of some 18,000 Indian medical students in Ukraine in crisis. Around 23,000 Indian medical students reportedly studying in China could not go back to that country after the pandemic struck. However, with China opening up student visas in August 2022, around 6,200 of them are said to have obtained visas.

OTHER COUNTRIES: Several countries are now making specific efforts to liberalise student visas for Indians.

In 2019, there were 10,000 Indian students in France; the country aims to attract 20,000 Indian students by 2025. In July 2021, France announced that fully vaccinated Indian students could travel to the country without restrictions. Greece plans to increase its outreach to Indian academic institutions through the official “Study in Greece” platform. The two countries have signed a Cultural and Educational Exchange Programme for 2022-2026.

FYI

According to the Minister of State in the Ministry of Education, Subhas Sarkar: Bureau of Immigration and Ministry of Home Affairs maintain departure and arrival data of Indians, there is no index for capturing the category of Indians going abroad for higher education.

The increase in the number of Indian nationals abroad corresponds with the latest immigration reports from some of the popular study-abroad destinations such as the US, UK, and Australia.

For the UK, the Immigration Statistics Report states that 127,731 visas were granted to Indian students in September 2022, an increase of 93,470 (+273 per cent) against 34,261 in 2019.

Similarly, in the US, the number of Indian students has more than doubled, and the Open Doors Report 2022 has predicted that the number of Indian students heading to America is likely to surpass those from China in 2022-23.

(Source: Rush to study abroad: What the numbers say on Indian students, their countries of preference by Divya A)

Point to ponder: Why lakhs of Indians go abroad to study?

Milind Sohoni in ‘The great exodus’ writes:

Firstly, it’s about jobs. From the income tax department data of the last few years, we see that there are about 3 crore taxpayers. Taking two-thirds of these as the number of salaried people and assuming an average tax-paying life of 20 years, we see that there are only about 10 lakh fresh jobs available each year. This includes both public and private sector jobs. More data from the income tax department show that of these, there are about 3 lakh “good” jobs which pay Rs 5 lakh per annum (LPA) or more, and 30,000 “posh” jobs which pay a starting salary of Rs 10 lakh-plus per annum. Of the 3 lakh good jobs, about 1 lakh come from the IT majors. The posh jobs come from multinational companies and are in marketing, finance, IT and global engineering services. Hardly any Indian company serving the Indian customer offers a starting salary of Rs 10 lakh per annum.

From the MHRD data, we see that India graduated about 30 lakh students last year from about 45,000 colleges. Given the recent employment data, there may be about 1 crore unemployed graduates seeking jobs. This is 10 times the number of salaried jobs, 30 times the good jobs and 300 times the number of posh jobs available every year.

Now, it is impossible for companies or state agencies to meaningfully interview such a large number of applicants for every job. The short-listing task for private companies is done by branded institutions and colleges.

Good jobs are concentrated in about 800 top colleges and posh jobs in 80-100 elite colleges such as the IITs and IIMs, St Stephen’s in Delhi, Presidency College in Kolkata and emerging elite private universities. It is only here that good companies will go and recruit, and where a student has a hope that her CV will be read. And hence the madness of competitive exams, closing ranks and coaching classes in high school and placement and packages in college.

Why are there so few jobs? The answer to that, our economists tell us, are outdated labour laws, inadequate investments and bureaucratic cholesterol. That may be, but here too, there is a deeper connection with higher education and it begins with the job description. This is the work that a person on a job must do through the week or month.

Consider, for example, a bus driver in MSRTC, the Maharashtra state regional bus service. Her weekly schedule, number of hours of service, the route etc., along with other job descriptions within MSRTC must be carefully designed. Together, they decide the efficiency, profitability and societal value provided by MSRTC. The performance of the enterprise needs to be periodically measured and analysed and the job descriptions updated. Such studies should be commissioned by the concerned IAS officer and done by the regional universities and consultancy firms.

Unfortunately for MSRTC, and for most state agencies such as irrigation, water supply or city administrations, this has not happened and they are now in a deadly spiral of decreasing efficiency and mounting losses. MSRTC itself faces a crippling strike and 93,000 jobs are at risk.

In fact, most job descriptions in the public sector have remained stagnant since independence. Thus, there is no statistician in the district public health department nor an economist in the agriculture department. If these had been there, we would have a much better understanding of the epidemic and its impact on our society.

There was and is a clear role for the elite central institutions, the IITs, the IISERs, JNU and others. They should look at the problems of the day, formalise them, and convert them into business models and job definitions which offer solutions that deliver value. They should then have supported local institutions and entrepreneurs in the deployment of these solutions. They have missed doing that. Instead, they have chosen to become accessories to the globalisation of knowledge and a highly unequal system of delivering the benefits of science to the people. As a result, they have very little primary experience in solving the hard problems that the world faces today.

(Source: Why lakhs of Indians go abroad to study? by Milind Sohoni)

Beyond the Issue

1. Case Study:  Farmer’s son fights socio-economic struggles to pursue Masters in Law from SOAS University of London by Deeksha Teri

Deepak Chatap grew up in Central India’s geographically underdeveloped area, infamous for farmer suicide and ultra-poverty. He was born and brought up in the family of a farmer in Chandrapur district (Maharashtra) wherein he completed his Class 12. While growing up, he witnessed struggles for fundamental rights, such as not receiving fair prices for agricultural produce, a lack of road connectivity, a primary healthcare system, etc. Additionally, his primary education was in the vernacular language, which made it difficult to pursue higher studies abroad.

‘Family’s fight for farmers rights was an inspiration to pursue law degree’

He had never imagined that he would be in the UK for his master’s studies in law. His family has been actively involved in the farmers’ movement which motivated him to bring social change from an early age. Therefore, he decided to pursue law. He secured admission at a prestigious Indian Law Society’s Law College, Pune.

When he started pursuing a law degree from Pune, he started the PATH initiative along with other like-minded law students. He, along with my peers, filed a case related to Arabian sea pollution before NGT resulted in water purification work. At that time, he was bestowed with the fellowship to enrich constitutional values among youth by the CORO India organisation.

Fast forward to his final year of a law degree and his senior suggested pursuing a masters degree in Human rights Law from the UK, however, he was hesitant due to funds. The senior told him about the fully funded UK Government’s Chevening Scholarship, which covers tuition fees, flight fares, and accommodation charges and gives monthly stipends too.

To qualify for this scholarship, applicants must have extensive work experience in their field of study. In his instance, he was working in the Human Rights area for over five years as an intern, legislative researcher, and founder of a non-profit organisation. He have obtained positive results from community lawyering for marginalised communities, wrote a book on farm laws, and developed an online course on constitutional morality.

‘Indian education system is exam driven, UK is research based’

“Studying for a master’s degree in the United Kingdom can maximise potential by providing possibilities for academic and personal development. Most master’s programmes in law in India last two years. Yet, in the United Kingdom, master’s degrees are provided for one year.

The education system in India is exam-driven, whereas the UK system relies on intensive independent research to generate essays and dissertations that help students build analytical and critical thinking skills.

In the UK, I have the opportunity to study with a varied student population from all around the world. Several of my classmates had prior job experience as United Nations law officers, domestic court judges, national government officials, and notable community lawyers. It helps me in comprehending legal issues from several approaches. They also informed me of additional worldwide prospects.

The Indian education system falls short of developing students’ ability in English language competence, research, and academic writing abilities, all of which are necessary for career advancement in the era of globalisation and study in the UK.” : Deepak Chatap

(Source: Farmer’s son fights socio-economic struggles to pursue Masters in Law from SOAS University of London by  Deeksha Teri)

2. In news: Canada migration racket

Some 700 Indian students are facing deportation from Canada after “admission offer letters” provided by a Jalandhar-based immigration agency were established as fake. As more and more Indian students are opting to study abroad, many are falling prey to unscrupulous agents.

Daksh Panwar writes:

Unconfirmed reports say that up to 700 former international students from India are facing deportation for faking college admission letters.

Immigration lawyer Jaswant Mangat is handling three dozen such cases. “The immigration department looks at these students as if they have committed fraud. But having interviewed them, I can say that these students are, in fact, the victims,” said Mangat, who practices law in Brampton and Mississauga. “They have paid so much money. They were looking for a bright future but now look at them. I think the minister of immigration (Sean Fraser) should show more compassion.”

He pointed out that there was a lapse on the Canadian immigration officers’ part as well: in issuing the study permit and the visa to these students without verifying their documents. “When it is so easy to verify by sending an email, why couldn’t these agencies do so,” Mangat asked.

However, others argue that Canada’s ever-increasing immigration and international student targets have strained its agencies, even as the recruitment of personnel to vet such a deluge of applications hasn’t kept pace.

(Source: Canada migration racket likely to be much bigger by Daksh Panwar)

3. Foreign universities in India: What are the regulations announced for foreign universities in India?

 Sourav Roy Barman Explains:

The Centre is set to open the door for foreign universities to set up campuses in India, pushing through an ambitious proposal that has run into political roadblocks in the past.