6,500 Indian Students Deported From Australia

[sri1]

A recent report in Australian media about the cancellation of a whopping 15,066 visas of foreign students has caused a flutter in India. The largest number of students - around 6,500 - who now face deportation, are Indian.

While the media report, which appeared in Australia's The Daily Telegraph, is based partly on annual figures for 2010-11 [url="http://www.sears.com/"]published by[/url] the Australian government's[url="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/search.cms?query=Department%20of%20Immigration%20and%20Citizenship"]Department of Immigration and Citizenship[/url] ([url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIAC"]DIAC[/url]), educational consultants and experts in India are not pressing the panic button yet.

Most of them feel that genuine Indian students who comply with the requirements of their visa have no reason to be concerned about deportation. The crackdown by the Australian government, which resulted in a 37% increase in student visa cancellations over the previous year, are part of series of steps being taken to benefit international students and weed out low-quality education service providers.

[b]Many Cases of Visa Expiry [/b]

"The visa cancellations have primarily hit Indian students in vocational education training [VET] in Australia who have violated their student visa terms. In some cases, the visas had expired rather than being cancelled. Many Indians joined courses only as a means of getting permanent residence in Australia and were not genuine students," says Harmeet Pental, regional director (South Asia), [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDP_Education"]IDP Education[/url], the largest organisation representing Australian universities.

It appears that around 8,000 of the cancelled student visas were cases of visa expiry when the time period ran out.

"Students need to ensure they don't get into such a situation. Among the visas which were genuinely cancelled by [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIAC"]DIAC[/url], over 2,200 occurred because the students withdrew from their courses," Pental adds.

Even as the DIAC is trying to spruce up the student-immigration process, reforms are also targeted at making things smooth for genuine students. A recent review by former New South Wales minister Michael Knight focuses on a easier visa policy for foreign students.

The Australian government has accepted all the recommendations of the Knight panel that will kick in from the first half of 2012. These include the end of mandatory cancellation of student visas for unsatisfactory attendance, unsatisfactory progress and working in excess of hours allowed. This will allow DIAC to decide cases on individual merit.

[tom bhayya]

[k2s]

[quote name='sri1' timestamp='1319931790' post='3046694']
A recent report in Australian media about the cancellation of a whopping 15,066 visas of foreign students has caused a flutter in India. The largest number of students - around 6,500 - who now face deportation, are Indian.

While the media report, which appeared in Australia's The Daily Telegraph, is based partly on annual figures for 2010-11 [url="http://www.sears.com/"]published by[/url] the Australian government's[url="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/search.cms?query=Department%20of%20Immigration%20and%20Citizenship"]Department of Immigration and Citizenship[/url] ([url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIAC"]DIAC[/url]), educational consultants and experts in India are not pressing the panic button yet.

Most of them feel that genuine Indian students who comply with the requirements of their visa have no reason to be concerned about deportation. The crackdown by the Australian government, which resulted in a 37% increase in student visa cancellations over the previous year, are part of series of steps being taken to benefit international students and weed out low-quality education service providers.

[b]Many Cases of Visa Expiry [/b]

"The visa cancellations have primarily hit Indian students in vocational education training [VET] in Australia who have violated their student visa terms. In some cases, the visas had expired rather than being cancelled. Many Indians joined courses only as a means of getting permanent residence in Australia and were not genuine students," says Harmeet Pental, regional director (South Asia), [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDP_Education"]IDP Education[/url], the largest organisation representing Australian universities.

It appears that around 8,000 of the cancelled student visas were cases of visa expiry when the time period ran out.

"Students need to ensure they don't get into such a situation. Among the visas which were genuinely cancelled by [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIAC"]DIAC[/url], over 2,200 occurred because the students withdrew from their courses," Pental adds.

Even as the DIAC is trying to spruce up the student-immigration process, reforms are also targeted at making things smooth for genuine students. A recent review by former New South Wales minister Michael Knight focuses on a easier visa policy for foreign students.

The Australian government has accepted all the recommendations of the Knight panel that will kick in from the first half of 2012. These include the end of mandatory cancellation of student visas for unsatisfactory attendance, unsatisfactory progress and working in excess of hours allowed. This will allow DIAC to decide cases on individual merit.
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