Canada’s cut on foreign student quota may force Indian aspirants to try options in East Europe

Indian students seeking a foreign degree will have to scout for new options after top favourite Canada took an axe to its international student permits programme.

“We’re granting 35% fewer international student permits this year. And next year, that number’s going down by another 10%,” said Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau on September 19. "Immigration is an advantage for our economy — but when bad actors abuse the system and take advantage of students, we crack down," Trudeau posted on his social media handle on X.

In January, Canada's immigration minister had noted that a reduction of 35% would lead to 364,000 approved study permits in 2024; now, a 10% further drop would mean that only 3,27,000 student permits will be issued in 2025.

Canada slashing permits by more than a third this year may prompt students to turn to destinations in Eastern Europe, a consultant said.

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"About 22% of our students (616 students) head to Canada while 7-10% go to the Eastern European nations," said Vaibhav Gupta, chief marketing officer, iSchoolConnect Pvt Ltd, an overseas education consultant. “We will see the intake for the latter increase. Colleges from Poland, Georgia, Estonia, Lithuania are coming to schools, holding counselling sessions to attract more students from India.”

Significant drop

The cap on international students and stricter work visa rules have forced thousands of students to seek other countries at the application stage itself. The Indian government informed Parliament in April that over 1.3 million students were studying abroad in 2024.

According to a PTI report quoting the government data - of the 1,335,878 Indian students, 427,000 were studying in Canada, 337,630 students in the US, 8,580 in China, eight in Greece, 900 in Israel, 14 in Pakistan and 2,510 in Ukraine.

Consultants said that the cloud over higher education will remain, and the dip will continue until Canada's elections due by October 2025.

At the University of Toronto, one of the Canada's largest, there has been a 40% fall in the number of applications from India this year. Calling the drop a significant one, Joseph Wong, vice-president, international at the university, told Mint in May that “the lack of clarity and the uncertainty had a dampening effect and that's reflected in the decline in the number of applications we received from Indian students this year."

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Students head abroad in two tranches - one in the August-September period and the other in January-February.

Akshay Chaturvedi, founder and CEO at Leverage Edu, said there has been an over 40% decline in queries for higher education for Canadian universities.

"Canada’s announcement regarding capping international student numbers further is short-sighted, and one that I’m confident will rebound very quickly," he said.

Housing problem

Over the past year, heading to Canada has become harder. Canada faces an acute housing crisis, and sufficient options are not available for many incoming students.

Canada also doubled the GIC (guaranteed investment certificate) from CAD$10,000 ( ₹6 lakh) to CAD$20,635 ( ₹12 lakh) effective from 2024. A GIC is similar to a secure investment and acts as proof that the student has the means to live and pay for expenses in Canada. One can get a GIC from Canadian financial institutions.

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The US, Canada, Australia and European countries such as Germany are preferred destinations for students to study engineering, medicine and science. Both Australia and Canada have instituted curbs in their student intake over the past year and a half through stringent background checks and increased GICs.