Changes in UK student visa entice youth in state

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, September 16

Recent changes brought in by the UK Government under the International Students’ Policy for the session 2020-2021 wherein a two-year work visa will be offered to a student after graduating from a British university has come as a major attraction for youth in Doaba.

At present, student graduates in the UK are allowed to look for work for only four months. However, from the next year, all international graduate students could qualify for a two-year period to work in the UK, increasing their chances of finding long-term employment after studying.

Moreover, with news got published in almost all newspapers and aired on channels, students from Jalandhar, Nawanshahr, Kapurthala and nearby villages have started visiting immigration offices to enquire about the next year intake and other formalities related to fee.

David Bailey, CEO, International Student Education Agency, Jalandhar, said the UK hopes to increase its 4,60,000 students to 6,00,000 by 2030 and will remove the ‘competitive disadvantage’ in recruitment of international students.

“British PM Boris Johnson has clearly shown a move from previous policies which wanted to bring net immigration down from hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands, creating a hostile immigration environment in the UK. We now see talks of a global Britain that wants to attract the brightest and the best and with public opinion changing, this is a good news for Indian students who wish to move to the UK,” Bailey said.

Giving details of fee structure in UK, David said student fee range between £12,000 to £5,000 per annum and with the option of offering their skills post-studies means that the UK would again become a more attractive destination than Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Europe.

Talking to this correspondent, Gurpal Singh Uppal, immigration solicitor from the UK, said: “It is a return to the policy that was scrapped by the coalition government in 2012. Theresa May, who was then home secretary, said the two-year post-study work visa was “too generous”. As a result, students from India dropped by 55 per cent from 51,218 in 2010-2011 to 22,757 in 2011-2012. It further went down to 15,388 in 2017-2018.”

He said under the new policy, visas would have no capping on numbers and would allow graduates to apply for jobs regardless of their skills or the subjects they studied. The government said part of the aim was to recruit talented graduates in disciplines such as mathematics, engineering and technology.

Uppal said the students’ migration to UK will definitely grow in the coming year and chances are that the UK would be the first preference for students as it had better job opportunities to offer than Canada.

Gurleen Kaur, a student who was spotted at an immigration office, said: “My relatives live in the UK, the moment they informed me about the changes in the rule, I decided to confirm it from immigration offices here so that I can apply for the next intake.”