6.7 lakh Surrendered Indian citizenship from 2015-19, 1.36 crore living abroad

NEW DELHI: More than 6.7 lakh people gave up their Indian citizenship and took the citizenship of other countries between 2015 and 2019, the Home Ministry informed Lok Sabha on Tuesday.

Congress member Karti P. Chidambaram had inquired about the number of Indians who renounced their Indian citizenship for the citizenship of another country during the last five years and the number of Indians currently residing in foreign countries.

Junior home minister Nityanand Rai, in a written reply, stated that the Ministry of External Affairs had put the total number of Indian citizens who gave up their citizenship at 6,76,074 and the number of Indian nationals living abroad at 1.36 crore.

The data showed that in the year 2015 1,41,656 Indians renounced their citizenship, while in 2016, 2017. 2018 and 2019 the numbers stood at 1,44,942, 1,27,905, 1,25,130 and 1,36,441 respectively.

Meanwhile, around 37 lakh people were issued Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) cards since 2005, though the number of such people decreased to 1.91 lakh in 2020 from 3.29 lakh in 2019.

The Junior Minister also stated that the government was not considering any proposal for dual citizenship.

According to RBI data, during 2018-2019, $76.4 billion was received as remittances from Indians abroad. During 2019-2020 (April-September), $41.9 billion was received.

The highest number of Indians living abroad are residing in the United Arab Emirates, where the 34,20,000 Indians comprise about one-fourth of all Indians abroad. The UAE is followed by Saudi Arabia (25,94,947), the US (12,80,000), Kuwait (10,29,861), Oman (7,79,351), Qatar (7,56,062), Nepal (5,00,000), UK (3,51,000), Singapore (3,50,000) and Bahrain (3,23,292).

According to the UN's International Migrant Stock 2019, the number of Indians living abroad comprises 6.4% of the total global migrant population. In 2019, with 17.5 million persons living abroad, India was the leading country of origin of international migrants, followed by Mexico with 11.8 million.

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