But growing opportunities like this from developed countries on the lookout for students – and for skilled labour – come with a caveat: the need to nix foreign education rackets. Only recently, GoI had to request the Canadian government to intervene in the case of some 700 Indian students facing deportation after they were found with fake college offer letters, courtesy operators running education rackets from the destination country, in this case, Canada. What holds for Canada also holds for other high-volume destinations like the US, Australia and European countries. In India, too, measures must be taken to ensure that dodgy institutions do not have the field to recruit students playing on their aspirations. Concerns about overstays also need to be addressed. And this is where foreign and Indian governments can very well collaborate to leverage Indian students studying abroad more mutual benefit. The recent India-France collaboration for post-study working visas is also a step in the right, reliable direction.
The free flow of students between countries must be encouraged, especially in a world that is interdependent in finding solutions to the most vexed global challenges. However, it is critical to ensure that mechanisms are put in place to prevent abuse of people and systems that sustain this very free flow. For young Indians, the growing demand for taking the study route can well be the conduit for a Maha Akhand Bharat scattered across the world.
