With one in every 20 migrants worldwide being born in India, India is a major contributor to global migration. According to the World Migration Report 2024, as of 2022, about 18 million people born in India were living in other countries of the world. Since 1990, when the United Nations began tracking the origins of migrants, India has consistently been one of the world’s leading countries of origin for migrants. The number of Indian migrants has more than doubled in the last 25 years, growing at twice the rate of the world’s total migrants. Most people of Indian origin live in the United Arab Emirates, the United States and Saudi Arabia. Currently, the United Arab Emirates has the largest number of Indian migrants, with around 3.5 million, mostly working as labourers. This is followed by the United States and Saudi Arabia, with around 2.7 and 2.5 million Indian migrants, respectively. Nearly nine out of every ten Indian-Americans living there were born in India, and as a community, Indo-Americans are the most educated and have the highest incomes of all racial and ethnic groups living in the United States.
Since the COVID-2019 pandemic, there has been an overall increase in global migration of people in search of better economic opportunities, financial security and stability, and India is no exception. Many Indians, especially the more motivated youth, have been continuously migrating abroad for better economic prospects. Discrimination against minorities in India on the basis of religion, caste, ethnicity or politics has also forced many to flee their homeland. However, the trend of migration from India to the United States is increasing for certain reasons, which is why legal immigration channels to the US often face significant backlogs. As a result, long waits for visitor visas or family-sponsored visas force many to adopt alternative unauthorized illegal routes. Unauthorized agents or smugglers are also using increasingly sophisticated methods to facilitate migration and are adopting new routes passing through different countries to reach the US from India. The southwestern border of the US with Mexico is currently a special platform for migrants from all over the world. The number of illegal Indian migrants entering the US has seen many ups and downs over the past few years. According to US Customs and Border Protection data, as of January 1, 2022, there were about 11 million unauthorized migrants living in the US. After Mexico and El Salvador, there are about 7,25,000 unauthorized Indians living in the US, who are the third largest population of illegal immigrants. According to US Customs and Border Protection data, during the fiscal year 2021-22, Officials have come across 63,927 Indians illegally entering the country, which is more than the previous fiscal year. There has been a remarkable increase in the number of illegal Indian immigrants crossing the US borders on foot. According to its latest figures, a record 96,917 Indians were arrested for illegally entering the US between October 2022 and September 2023, which is five times more than the same period in 2019 to 2020. An average of 8,000 Indians were being arrested every month and the highest number of arrests was recorded in April 2023 at 12,537. But despite this record number, the number of illegal Indians arrested at US borders is very low compared to other countries, especially Latin America. For example, 7.35 lakh Mexicans and 2.16 lakh Hondurans were also caught during the same period.
Illegal immigration to the United States remains a continuing challenge and a major policy issue due to the increasing illegal immigration from unusual countries of origin. In 2022, there were a record 2.4 million encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border. Many of these included migrants who had attempted to enter the United States illegally multiple times. For many years, most such irregular migrants were coming from Latin American countries such as Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. But in 2022, for the first time, there were more encounters with migrants from Venezuela, Cuba, and the Bolivarian Republic of Nicaragua. Many migrants were also coming from Haiti, Brazil, and countries outside the region such as India and Ukraine.
According to the popular news agency Reuters, recently the U.S. And Salvadoran authorities have noticed an unusual pattern of charter flights landing in El Salvador, mostly carrying Indian nationals. The planes arrive loaded with passengers but return empty. Some even claim to be tourists, despite carrying only a suitcase for weeks-long journeys. Subsequent investigation revealed that almost all of these charter passengers were crossing the border into the US after landing in El Salvador. The phenomenon represents a new route for illegal immigration into the US. Most migrants coming from outside Latin America are paying large sums of money to a network of smugglers for travel packages that include airline tickets for flights to Central America as well as bus and hotel accommodation along the US-Mexico border. Even some charter transportation companies are exploiting migrants by charging exorbitant prices and facilitating irregular migration to the US.
As a result, the number of migrants apprehended at the southwestern US border has reached a record high of more than two million in the last fiscal year. Was this a significant issue in the US presidential elections held in November? There are strong possibilities that the newly elected President Donald Trump will bring a tough policy in this regard. By the way, the US administration has also started sending back illegal immigrants who are caught by plane.
