India-Canada tensions spill onto students, education consultancies

Kolkata, India – For the past several years, Manpreet Singh has been dreaming of going abroad for higher studies.

The 22-year-old Sikh, a resident of Moradabad in Uttar Pradesh state, chose Canada as his destination as that is where many of the Sikh diaspora is settled.

But the current diplomatic tension between India and Canada has put a damper on those plans, leaving him disappointed. Singh is now planning to go to Europe and complete his education.

“Canada was always on the top of my list for foreign education as several people of our community are settled there, and I would have felt at home there. I had convinced my parents to send me, but they have now refused due to the present turmoil between the two countries,” he said.

His father, Inderjeet Singh, told Al Jazeera that his son’s safety is his top priority. “We also want our child to get a good education, and I had agreed to his Canada plan. But the current situation has made me rethink, and I prefer to send him to a safer country,” he said.

Several students from India, especially the northern states of Punjab and Haryana, who had been aspiring to go to Canada for higher education, have put their plans on hold due to the escalating tension between the two countries over the killing last year of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian Sikh involved with the Sikh independence movement, commonly known as the Khalistan movement, that calls for an independent Sikh state.

Nijjar was shot dead by two masked gunmen in Surrey, British Columbia, in western Canada last year in June.

Since then, Ottawa has said New Delhi staged the attack on Canadian soil and has even accused Indian Minister of Home Affairs Amit Shah of being behind a campaign of violence and intimidation targeting Sikh activists. It has also expelled several Indian diplomats, including as recently as in October in the latest round of this political face-off, resulting in similar retaliatory actions.

In light of India-Canada tensions, Manpreet Singh’s parents have refused to send him to Canada for higher studies [Courtesy of Manpreet Singh]

Students affected

Political repercussions apart, the tension between the two countries has come as a major blow to several thousand Indian students who aspire to go to Canada for undergraduate and postgraduate courses every year.

The situation has also affected education and immigration consultants, who depend on these students for their livelihood and charge anywhere between 50,000 rupees ($594) to 500,000 rupees ($5,945) depending upon the country and the university selection, and help students in the application and documentation process.

Of the more than 1.3 million Indian students studying abroad in 2024, Canada tops the position with 427,000 – which is 41 percent of total international students in Canada. The United States has 337,000 students, the United Kingdom has 185,000 students, and Germany hosts 42,997 Indian students, as per data from the Ministry of External Affairs.

Pratibha Jain, the founder of Eduabroad, a consultancy which for the past three decades has helped students get admission into some of the top universities across the globe, told Al Jazeera that there has been about a 10 percent decline in queries for Canada and the trend has been shifting to other countries instead including the UK, Australia, Dubai and in Europe.

Tightening entry

Apart from the current tension, Canada’s domestic political and economic situation is also deterring foreign students.

In January, the Canadian government announced an intake cap on international student permit applications for the next two years, citing pressure on housing, healthcare and other services. The cap is expected to reduce by 35 percent the student intake in 2024 as compared to 2023, and which will be followed by an additional 10 percent reduction in 2025.

Gurtej Singh Sandhu, an education consultant based in Chandigarh, estimates that there are more than 150,000 educational and immigration consultancies in the northern states of Punjab, Haryana and Delhi generating an annual turnover of about 12 billion rupees ($142.42m) and many reliant on sending students to Canada for a vast chunk of their revenue.

“The business of education consultancy from Canada has come down to just 20-25 percent and several consultancies have been forced to close their operations”, Sandhu said.

To be fair, the student visa has so far also been a route for many international students to settle in Canada as graduates of Canadian universities could apply for what is known as an open work permit, allowing them to work across sectors, including in jobs that had no connection with their studies. Any spouses could also get a visa, allowing them to work. This open plan had helped spawn several educational institutions, including private career colleges offering courses in collaboration with public sector colleges, of vastly varying calibre.

Now, the Justin Trudeau government has barred private and public-private colleges from issuing open work permits and has only allowed postgraduate students studying in public colleges and universities to get these permits. Spouse permits allowing them to work are continuing. These changes “are further deterring Indians from moving to Canada”, Sandhu said.

High expenses

The Guaranteed Investment Certificate (GIC) fee, a mandatory liquid investment in banks in Canada for international students, has also more than doubled to $20,635 since January, further deterring Indian students.

Maninder Singh Arora, founder of Apexvisas, a Pune-based immigration and visa consultancy, told Al Jazeera that Canada’s housing shortage and the high cost of living have also forced students to rethink their plans. “The demand for Canada is not over, but it has obviously decreased to a much extent,” Arora said.

“We have sent around 55 students to Canada this year as compared to 80 last year. The high expenses and negativity about the country in terms of housing and political issues have been contributing to the downfall,” he explained.

Manan Gupta, a regulated Canadian immigration consultant (RCIC) in Brampton, a Toronto suburb popular with Indians, told Al Jazeera that while international students contributed around $37.3bn to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2022, it was necessary to reduce their numbers “as the infrastructure in Canada is yet to match the high influx of people coming from outside and using education as a backdoor to take up jobs and settle here,” he said. “Most of the parents will also deter to send their children in a country where there no diplomats to handle any untoward situation,” he added.

The future of immigration in Canada, he said, would depend on the poll outcomes as elections are due by October.