Indian professionals, students, and healthcare workers make up the majority of those with UK visas

The number of visas granted in the skilled worker category increased by a meager 9%, with Indian nationals leading the charge. The number of “Skilled Worker—Health and Care” visas increased significantly, more than doubling and rising by 135% to 143,990 awards. India, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe saw the largest increases in the issuance of this visa.

The latest immigration statistics from the UK Home Office indicate that skilled workers, physicians, and students from India remained a vital part of the country’s visa market. According to data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) for the year ending in September 2023, Indian residents topped both the skilled worker and health and care visa categories. 

The number of visas granted in the skilled worker category increased by a meager 9%, with Indian nationals leading the charge. The number of “Skilled Worker—Health and Care” visas increased significantly, more than doubling and rising by 135% to 143,990 awards. India, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe saw the largest increases in the issuance of this visa. While there was a notable 76% rise in Indian applications for the Health and Care visa, the number of visas given under the Skilled Worker route fell by 11%, from 20,360 in September 2022 to 18,107 in September 2023. 

43% of students who were granted a post-study graduate visa were Indian citizens, making them a disproportionately large group. 133,237 grants were made to Indian nationals for sponsored study visas, a 5% increase over the previous year. The fact that this figure has increased by nearly five times since September of last year shows how well-liked Indian students are growing. 

Indian nationals constituted the largest percentage (27%), followed by Chinese (19%) and Turkish (6%), in the ‘Visitor’ visa category. However, Indian nationals came in second place, with 43,445 dependents, behind Nigerian nationals in the category of dependents of international students. 

This change is a result of recently implemented rules that restrict dependent family members for overseas students, especially those enrolled in postgraduate research programs. Albanian, Indian, and Chinese nationals made up 64% of the illegal migrants who voluntarily returned to the UK as a result of the India-UK Migration and Mobility Partnership. 

Even though the UK government, led by the Conservative Party, has committed to lowering overall migration, the ONS statistics showed a modest decline in numbers. In comparison to the previous year’s 745,000, net migration for the 12 months ending in June 2023 was 672,000. The top five non-EU nationalities by immigration flows into the UK were Chinese, Pakistani, Indian, Nigerian, and Ukrainian