How illegal Indian entrants to US jumped 40 times in four years

The serial deportation of illegal Indian immigrants has been hitting the headlines since US president Donald Trump took office on January 20. In a study by Johns Hopkins University, released on February 10 after the first flight with immigrants landed in India on February 5, puts the data of past two decades in perspective on how and why the latent issue of illegal immigrants turned into a key issue in the US presidential election.

“At the turn of the decade, US borders and ports witnessed an unprecedented surge in migrant encounters, reaching levels unseen in over 20 years. Notably, the number of Indians apprehended—formerly a small group among encountered migrants—skyrocketed by 40 times in just four years, from around 1,000 in FY2020 to a peak of 43,000 in 2023, and 40,000 in 2024,” the report reveals.

The peak of 2023 significantly exceeded the previous high recorded in 2018, when 9,000 Indian nationals were apprehended while crossing the border. Prior to 2010, the total number of border encounters involving Indians was minor, never exceeding 1,000.

In 1990, the number of unauthorised Indians living in the US was 28,000, but by 2024, this number had jumped to 700,000-725,000, according to the Center for Migration Studies and Pew Research Center.

Processes in the US immigration system allow an illegal entrant at the border to seek legal protection and apply for asylum. Data collected by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) found that the total number of new asylum requests involving Indian nationals in the US has grown tenfold in just two years, from about 5,000 in 2021 to over 51,000 in 2023.

Cross-national data from OECD reveals an over eight-time increase in the number of new asylum requests from Indian nationals in the US since the turn of the decade, rising from approximately 6,000 in 2020 to over 51,000 in 2023. Though this sharp growth in asylum requests is by far the most notable in the US, the trend is also evident in Canada, United Kingdom and Australia, where Indians constitute one of the largest origin groups among all asylum seekers.

Trump had acted tough on illegal immigrants in his first term as well. According to the ministry of external affairs, about 750 immigrants were deported annually on an average during the Barack Obama presidency years, 1,550 during Trump’s first presidency and 900 during the Joe Biden presidency.

The study analyses one key point that continues to fox everyone: who are these illegal immigrants and why do they undertake this perilous journey? Cumulative data from immigration court records, based on submissions by US Customs and Border Protection and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and US Citizenship and Immigration Services, between October 2021 and November 2022, of asylum filings by Indians based on language spoken, revealed 66 per cent of all asylum requests were by Punjabi-speaking people. English speakers followed at 8 per cent, Gujarati at 7 per cent, and Tamil, Urdu and other language speakers at less than 1 per cent.

Interestingly, data also suggests Punjabi speakers are most likely to have their asylum requests approved. Data from Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) reveals 63 per cent of Punjabi speakers were granted asylum, compared 58 per cent of Hindi speakers and only 25 per cent of Gujarati speakers.

Seeking answer to why these individuals and families risked their lives to enter the US, the study’s authors Addy Budiman and Devesh Kapur write, “Asylum seekers are from some of India’s wealthiest states, who are more likely capable of bearing the high costs of migrating. Gujarat and Punjab have a tradition of seeking better lives overseas. India received $120 billion in remittances in 2023. The vast majority of asylum seekers are economic migrants who face limited economic opportunities at home and thus seek employment opportunities abroad. This became visually apparent in opulent homes, meaning they are not trying to escape poverty but relative deprivation.”

The researchers claim they have seen very little evidence of India’s poor marginalised communities or those from regions with ongoing anti-militancy operations by the government among asylum seekers.

This is further underlined by the fact that the financial costs of coming to the US through the arduous journey through Latin and Central America to Mexico, or as ‘fake’ international students to Canada, are 30 to 100 times India’s per capita income. “Only those with assets that can be pledged or sold (especially land) can afford to make the journey. Notably, Punjab and Gujarat are among India’s richer states with land values far in excess of the economic returns in agriculture,” the authors note.

Where there is demand and will, supply will find a way. While speaking at the recent joint presser with Trump, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while agreeing to accept illegal Indians deported by the US, said the two countries will work together to crack down on the human trafficking network.

The study, however, says that while the full industry of agents and brokers sprang up in India, “India’s home ministry looked the other way because the issue of illegal migration is much more a burden for receiving than sending countries”.

“India has few options. It’s hard to defend illegal migrants, and the larger goal of maintaining relations with the Trump administration means that it will swallow its pride and largely accept the hardline stance. Modi’s team has agreed to facilitate the repatriation of 18,000 unauthorised Indians from the US. However, the complete deportation of all unauthorised Indian migrants is a pie-in-the-sky objective, largely due to the immense logistical challenges and time constraints. Nonetheless we expect unauthorised migration to the US to drop sharply, and from India even more so,” the authors surmise.