In a major jolt to India’s education-export pipeline, Australia has pushed the refusal rate for Indian student-visa applicants to **40 %** in February—its highest in two decades—after moving India from ‘Evidence Level 2’ to the stricter ‘Evidence Level 3’ under the Simplified Student Visa Framework (SSVF). The shift obliges Indian aspirants to produce far more granular financial and academic evidence to prove genuine-student intent. Home-affairs data show that while overall refusals jumped to 32.5 % in February, South-Asian cohorts were hit hardest: 60 % for Nepal, 47 % for Bangladesh and 40 % for India, versus just 3 % for China. Only **34,000** student visas were granted to all nationalities in January–February, the lowest issuance since 2013 outside COVID shutdowns. Australian policymakers argue the crackdown is needed to curb migration levels that fed a housing-price surge and sparked political backlash. Yet for India—Australia’s largest source of permanent migrants and its second-largest source of foreign students—the move threatens an export industry worth A$4.3 billion in tuition and living-expense outflows. Indian education agents report that deposits for the July intake are already being diverted to Canada and the UK. Delhi-based relocation firm Leap Scholar says enquiries for Germany and the Netherlands have jumped 27 % in the last fortnight as students seek visa-friendlier STEM destinations. Universities Australia has lobbied Canberra to adopt a risk-tiered instead of nationality-tiered model, warning of staff layoffs and campus closures if enrolments plunge. Prospective Indian students are advised to budget a six-month lead time for document collation and to prioritise ‘low-risk’ Group-of-Eight universities, which historically enjoy slightly lower refusal rates. Lenders are also tightening education-loan disbursals until clearer acceptance trends emerge.
Source: The Times of India
