Canadian conundrum for Indian would-be immigrants

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ast April, 28-year-old Yuvraj Singh from Gurdaspur in the northern Indian state of Punjab tied the knot with an Indian-origin Canadian citizen. The newlyweds dreamed of a life together in Canada, but their plans were put on hold as the ongoing diplomatic standoff between India and Canada led to unexpected and prolonged delays in Yuvraj receiving his Canadian permanent-resident permit (PR). 

He finally received his PR last Dec. 6 and has since submitted his passport to the Canadian Embassy for stamping. But with no end in sight yet in the tiff between New Delhi and Ottawa, there is no telling if and when the processes in the diplomatic missions of both countries will have another upheaval and upset the plans of Indians and Indian Canadians even more.

An Indian immigrant who has called Canada home for more than a decade now even says that he will seriously reconsider his future in his adopted country. 

He recalls how worried he was when India temporarily paused visas for Canadian citizens in 2023, after recently resigned Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused India of being involved in the killing of Canadian Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who advocated for a separate Khalistan. India dismissed Trudeau’s allegations as baseless, leading to a diplomatic standoff.  

“At that moment, I instantly regretted becoming a (Canadian) citizen and wished I had kept my permanent residency so I could visit India freely,” says the Indian immigrant. “It’s also a concern the other way around – parents of people living here are either not getting super visas or are being issued shorter ones. This has become a major worry for the Indian community here.” (A super visa provides multiple entries for up to 10 years.)

Last year, aside from India halting visa services for Canadians, both countries expelled diplomats and trade talks were put on hold. Bilateral relations became strained and ties were disrupted. People-to-people connections also hit snarls and the plans of thousands of Indians to move to Canada either temporarily or permanently went awry.

Then just this October, Trudeau accused India once more, this time for “supporting criminal activity against Canadians…on Canadian soil.” The Canadian leader made his allegations following those from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) that, as reported by Canadian media, said “agents of the Indian government” were involved in “widespread violence…including homicides” in Canada. 

India again denied the allegations. After Canada announced that it was expelling six Indian diplomats, India ordered six of Canada’s own to pack their bags.

Processing slowdown

In an interview with Reuters nearly two weeks after Trudeau’s latest jab at New Delhi, Canada’s Immigration Minister Marc Miller revealed that only four immigration officials remain in India, a sharp decline from 27 in October 2023. Miller acknowledged that this significantly hampers Canada’s ability to process visas locally. 

Indeed, while Yuvraj Singh finally has his PR and is a step closer to reuniting with his wife, the fact remains that a process that used to take a maximum of three months stretched to six in his case. 

“I have told my colleagues in Parliament that this could get worse before it gets better, and they need to brace for it,” Reuters quoted Miller as saying. 

The tiff, of course, has impacts that go beyond travel and migration issues. Dr. Saira Bano, an assistant professor of political studies at Thompson Rivers University in Canada, echoes other academics in saying that the two countries must work to improve their relationship to maintain a balanced power dynamic in the Indo-Pacific region. 

The United States and its allies are strengthening ties with India as part of their Indo-Pacific strategies, Bano says, but the ongoing diplomatic crisis between Canada and India is hindering the effective alignment and implementation of these strategies. 

Yet Bano also concedes that the standoff’s impact on individuals should not be ignored, especially since Canada is a favored destination of many Indian would-be emigrants. 

In truth, even though work in both countries’ diplomatic missions have slowed down significantly, India still emerged as number one among the top 10 source countries of Canada’s newest permanent residents from January to July 2024.

At present, Canada has the fourth largest Indian immigrant population – 2.9 million – in the world, following the United States, the United Arab Emirates, and Malaysia. It also currently hosts the most number of Indian students outside of India at 427,000. In 2022 alone, international students contributed nearly US$31 billion to the Canadian economy, with those from India forming the largest cohort and a significant share of this revenue stream.  

According to Bano, because of the current diplomatic crisis between India and Canada, “the Indian diaspora is caught in a difficult position, as they have deep ties to both their home country and their host country.”

“Many are experiencing social anxiety and concerns over disruptions in diplomatic services,” she adds. “They hope for improved relations between India and Canada to ease these tensions.”

But that is easier said than done. Bano explains, “The Khalistan issue has long been a point of tension between India and Canada. India sees it as a national security threat, fearing a resurgence of militancy, while Canada views it as a matter of freedom of expression, supporting peaceful protest.”

“Although Canada officially respects India’s territorial integrity and does not support the movement,” she says, “this difference in perspective has led to a diplomatic crisis, halting free trade agreement talks and reducing international student enrollment and tourism between the two countries.”

A play with local targets

Yet some say that Canada’s domestic politics may be playing a bigger role in its diplomatic tussle with India and in what has been generally assumed as its travel and migration impact.

After all, it was not until Trudeau pointed a finger at New Delhi for Nijjar’s death last year that the relations between the two countries began to go south. The Indian Canadian who says he will rethink his future if Trudeau wins again, for instance, believes that the Canadian premier made the allegation to pander to the Sikh community to help him keep his post.  

Joe Adam George, a national security and foreign policy analyst with the Canadian think tank Macdonald-Laurier Institute, also blames what he says is Trudeau’s focus on identity and vote-bank politics for the current breakdown in India-Canada relations.

The vote-bank theory is not without basis. Citing federal data, a CBC report said that Canada has the largest Sikh community – 770,000 strong or 2.1% of the country’s population – outside of India.

Sikhs actually made up most of the Indian migrants who settled in Canada at the turn of the century, according to labor and migration expert Rupa Banerjee of the Toronto Metropolitan University. But, she said in a chapter that appeared in the book India Migration Report 2024: Indians in Canada, it was not until 2013 that Indian immigration to Canada began seeing massive growth.

“The aspiration to come to Canada was often driven by familial networks, including extended family, who are already settled in the country,” Banerjee wrote. “The growth of the Indian diaspora and ethno-religious organizations and businesses has expanded support systems for newcomers, easing the acculturation process and paving the way for the next cohort of arrivals.”

She noted as well, “The influx of Indian immigrants into Canada since 2013 is likely also related to the lack of opportunities to settle in the United States.”

As for Canada being a popular destination for Indian students, Banerjee said that this was “due to its reputation for providing high-quality yet comparatively affordable education, an easy study permit application process, and the potential for attaining permanent resident status after graduation.”

Citing the findings of other scholars, she said, “Most Indian students view international studies as a route to immigration and actively look for destinations that enable or facilitate transition to permanent resident…status.”

An election issue

But getting a student’s visa from Canada may no longer be as easy even for non-Indian nationals. Canada has capped new student permits for two years due to a housing crisis and to ensure school quality. In January, permits were reduced by 35% to 364,000 for 2024. Another 10% was announced last September, bringing the total to 327,000 for 2025. 

Immigration Minister Miller has said that this was in line with the government’s aims to maintain a “sustainable level of temporary residence in Canada.”

In a video uploaded to his YouTube channel in late November, Trudeau said: “In the last two years, our population has grown rapidly, like a baby boom…Increasingly, bad actors like fake colleges and big corporations have exploited our immigration system for their own interests.” 

To address this, he announced, “We are reducing the number of immigrants coming to Canada for the next three years.”

Immigration has become a key issue in Canada’s election campaigns. An August 2024 report by the market research firm Leger found that 65% of Canadians believed the government’s immigration plan admits too many immigrants. Of those surveyed, 78% felt immigration was contributing to the housing crisis, and 72% believed Canada’s immigration policy was too lenient.

Tejasvijay Singh, who has been living in Canada for the last three years, agrees with the Canadian government’s decision to reduce the number of immigrants.

A photographer who first arrived in Canada on a student’s visa, he muses: “I think they need to focus on quality over quantity. When I was in Delhi, I was competing with 10 people for a photographer’s job. In Canada, I’m still competing with those same 10 people from Delhi for the same position.”

Macdonald-Laurier’s George says that any decline in the number of Indian students coming to Canada would likely be driven not by the diplomatic standoff, but by internal challenges such as a struggling economy, scarce job opportunities, and visa scandals. He also says that Trudeau should be pointing a finger at himself for Canada’s worsening employment situation, which is among the reasons why the government is tightening policies on student permits.

“The decline in employment opportunities is a direct consequence of Trudeau’s mismanagement of the economy and failed policies,” George says. “And it was already happening long before the (diplomatic) crisis broke out. Canada is now in a recession with no immediate relief in sight, at least until after a new government takes charge next year.”

Newlywed Yuvraj Singh, though, seems unperturbed when asked about how he feels about his future in a country where, just like India, there are cost of living challenges and lack of job opportunities. He says he has friends in Canada and that he is hopeful that something will work out. ◉