Indian diaspora is world’s largest: International Organization for Migration

- ADVERTISEMENT -

According to the ‘World Migration Report (2018)’, published by the International Organization for Migration, a UN agency, the Indian diaspora is the world’s largest diaspora, with a little more than 15.6 million people from India living overseas.

According to the report, in 2015, the Indian diaspora constituted six percent of the total number of international migrants with an estimate of 243 million people which means that out of global population of 7.3 billion, one of every 30 people was a migrant in 2015.

If computed as a percentage of the world’s population, the growth of the diaspora has been largely static, from 3.2% in 2010 to 3.3% in 2015, with those between the ages of 20 to 64 years, accounting for nearly 72 percent of that amount.

The report states that nearly half of all international migrants throughout the world were born in Asia, primarily originating from India, China and other South Asian countries.

After India, Mexico has the second largest diaspora followed by Russia, China, Bangladesh and Pakistan and since 1970; the U.S. has been the main destination for international migrants and the number of foreign-born people residing in the U.S. has almost quadrupled from fewer than 12 million in 1970 to 46.6 million in 2015 with nearly two million being Indian.

But it is actually the Gulf nations who house the biggest population of the Indian diaspora with nearly 3.5 million or 22 percent living in the UAE and 1.9 million or 12 percent living in Saudi Arabia.

According to a Times of India report, immigration experts say that it is very likely more Indians will migrate to other countries through the H-1B visa program as “we are witnessing intense vetting of applications for H-1B, the most popular work visa for Indians headed to the US, and entry into the US is likely to involve stricter rules.”