Of 403 Indian Student Deaths Abroad Since 2018, 91 were from Canada, 48 from UK, Rajya Sabha Told

In the last five years, 403 Indian students have died while studying abroad due to various causes, including health, accidents, natural deaths, the Ministry of External Affairs data shows. Canada has the highest number of death cases of Indian students at 91.

V Muraleedharan, the Minister of State for External Affairs, told Rajya Sabha that 403 incidents of death of Indian students abroad have been reported since 2018.

Besides Canada, other countries where the death of Indian students is high are the UK, Russia, US and Australia at 48, 40, 36 and 35.

Germany (20), Italy (10), Philippines (10), Cyprus (14) and Ukraine (21) were other countries reporting high number of deaths of Indian students. Other countries reporting fewer deaths are Belgium (1), Bulgaria (1), China (9), Czech Republic (3), Egypt (3), Finland (4), France (4), Guyana (1), Kazakhstan (5), Kenya (1), Korea (ROK) (3), Kyrgyzstan (9), Malta (1), Norway (1), Pakistan (1), Qatar (9), Romania (2), South Africa (1), Spain (3), Suriname (3), Sweden & Latvia (2), Switzerland (1) and Taiwan (6).

News18 had earlier reported that the number of Indian students in Canada whose mortal remains are returned to India each month ranges from five to eight on average. Some of the major reasons behind those deaths were suicides, accidents, killings, drug overdoses, heart attacks, and drowning.

“We’re about four to five repatriations a month right now,” said Kamal Bhardwaj, president and owner of Lotus Funeral & Cremation Center in Etobicoke, Ontario. Lotus Funeral Center has been repatriating the remains of Indian citizens from across Canada for years at the request of the Consulate General of India and other members of the Indian diaspora.

As per the claim of the funeral home in a Canadian Media Report, 33 bodies of students were sent to India last year compared to 11 in 2021. The number kept increasing from eight in 2018 to 16 in 2019 and 12 in 2020.

According to the data previously released by the MEA, an estimated 1.83 lakh Indian students were enrolled in Canada last year, 4.65 lakh in the US, 1 lakh in Australia, 55,400 in UK and 18,300 in Russia.