Ground Reality: Aussie bound Indian student numbers down 77% NOT BY HALF. Newspapers and Experts foxed by data.

Ground Reality: Aussie bound Indian student numbers down 77% NOT BY HALF. Newspapers and Experts foxed by confusing stats that include re-issued visas.

In yesterday’s The Australian, UNSW Pro VC (International) is quoted that the Indian student visa numbers are down to 29,721. Today in The Age, Stephen Connelly echoes the same number (see link). They are not wrong but the number that they refer to is not just of Indian students issued visas offshore and those issued eVisas BUT also those who were given visa extensions and re-issued visas onshore. From the words used in the two articles I guess they have not picked up the difference or have got foxed by the DIAC spin.

The ground reality is that the student visa numbers for July 2009 to June 2010 for offshore grants including eVisas is actually down by 77%. The stats of both types are available on the http://www.immi.gov.au/media/statistics/study/

Now lets look at comparative stats from United Kingdom: The student visas issued during Jan to December 2009 over 2008 were actually 100% increased. Need we say more!!!

I expect the 2010-2011 student visas grant offshore (and evisa) to actually go down further to about 8000 and then expect a gradual growth over the coming years from mid 2011 onwards and my prediction in 5 years is that the total student visas to Indians will rise to an optimum of 15000-20000. I feel that this is the limit and capacity.

On 20^th August 2010, I made a presentation to staff members of 22 Australian Institutions and am sharing a few slides from that presentation. (The source of the data for Australia is already provided above. The source of the UK data is British Council.)

aus 09-10

UK 2009 over 08

Ways to quicken turnaround