Indians sent abroad sufficient amount of money within a period of ten years to build 62 IITs, RBI figures

Indians have sent a whopping Rs 1.76 lakh crore abroad in the last decade to finance studies of students who are studying abroad, new Reserve Bank of India (RBI) figures have revealed. The amount is so colossal that it would have been sufficient to build over 60 new IITs.

In 2023–24 alone, students transferred a combined total of almost Rs 29,000 crore abroad to pursue studies, slightly short of last year's figure. A decade ago, this figure was a paltry Rs 2,429 crore. That is education remittances have grown as much as 1,200% in the past decade.

The RBI released this data in response to a Right to Information (RTI) application, in US dollars initially and subsequently converted into rupees based on the existing exchange rate.

Although there is a decline in student travel, yet the spending remains high. The number of Indians traveling abroad for studies actually declined by 15% in 2024 as opposed to 2023 since several nations strengthened their visa conditions.

Government data reveal that 7,59,064 students left the country for studies in 2024, down from 8,92,989 in 2023. But the number is still much higher than during the pre-pandemic period. In 2019, only 5.9 lakh students had left the country.

OVERSEAS SPENDING VS INDIA'S EDUCATION BUDGET

The level of spending abroad becomes clearer by contrast with India's higher education budget. The Union government has budgeted approximately Rs 50,078 crore with the Department of Higher Education for 2025–26. Indians alone spent more than half this amount on overseas education over the last year. Over the decade, the total so far is well over three times the government's aggregate higher education budget annually.

That is, if it is taking approximately Rs 2,823 crore to set up one IIT currently, the amount of money drained out of the nation in a single year alone could have established over 10 IITs. The total outflow for 10 years could have built some 62 of them.

NO CLARITY ON BANK CHARGES

Even though the RBI detailed how much money is sent out of India for education, it does not know about bank fees or mark-ups on foreign exchange that students and their parents incur while sending money abroad. The central bank also did not have figures on whether more of these remittances were through banks or non-banks like fintech platforms.

Between FY 2018–19 onwards, RBI statistics show the education remittance transactions have risen sharply — from 3.63 lakh in 2018–19 to nearly 10 lakh during 2022–23, before decreasing slightly to 9.43 lakh in 2023–24.

The figures paint a telling picture: Indian families are shelling out more than ever before to send their children overseas to study at advanced levels. And while the numbers indicate a foreign education spend boom, they also raise challenging questions regarding the quality, capacity, and affordability of higher learning at home.