Reportedly, the Covid-19-related travel restrictions have been eased for Indian students in many including the UK, the US, Canada, Germany and the Netherlands.
Several Nations Open For Indian Students
Now, several nations are expected to open up as the situation improves, as informed by the minister of state for external affairs, V Muraleedharan informed Parliament on Thursday.
Further, Muraleedharan said the external affairs ministry has been making efforts to easing travel restrictions for Indians enrolled in foreign universities, in the written replies to several questions in the Rajya Sabha on Indians studying abroad and the impact of the Covid-19-related restrictions on them.
Work In Progress For Ease On Travel Restrictions
He added, “Our missions abroad have been actively taking up these issues with the respective governments and have been impressing upon those governments to ease the travel restrictions. Also, the issue of travel restrictions has been taken up at the ministerial level with several countries,”.
The travel restrictions have been eased for Indian students by countries such as the US, the UK, Canada, Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and Georgia as of date.
Moving ahead, more and more countries are expected to open up travel in the future.
Launch Of Global Indian Students Portal
So far, around 1,133,749 Indians study in 99 countries around the world, as per the data furnished by Muraleedharan in the Rajya Sabha.
Out of these countries, a large numbers of Indian students are Canada (215,720), the US (211,930), United Arab Emirates (219,000), Australia (92,383), Saudi Arabia (80,800), the UK (55,465), Oman (43,600), New Zealand (30,000), China (23,000), Germany (20,810), Russia (16,500) France (10,000 each) and the Philippines (15,000) Kyrgyzstan.
Apart from this, Muraleedharan also mentioned the government developing a “Global Indian Students Portal (GISP)” for Indian students who want to go abroad for studies.
Basically, this portal will have information on courses, foreign universities, nodal officers and accreditation requirements to help students make informed decisions and is also expected to be launched in 2022.