Are People Really Moving Back To India?

While we tend to make decisions that suit our peculiar needs, one of the data points we usually look at is whether other people are also doing this. Maybe we seek validation of our decision, maybe we are looking to learn from their experiences. Whatever the reason, it always helps to get an idea from people in similar situations. So are people permanently moving back to India?

Have you been met with a “shocked eye-ball popped out and jaw dropped” kind of look when you first discussed your return to India plans with someone? Have you been accused of wasting your god-gifted golden opportunity (the opportunity of course being one where you moved abroad)? You are not alone. These were the exact reactions we got when we announced our grand plans to move back to India. The reaction was uniform across friends, families and even parents. They wanted us to rethink this a hundred times. Their social circles expressed severe doubts over our mental well-being and declared that our decision-making abilities have been overly impacted by the COVID situation. We would be lying if we said this did not affect our confidence. It created self-doubt and made us worried that we were making the wrong decision. After all, if so many people are saying the same thing, they must be on to something, right?

What if I told you that along with you, many people are considering moving back to India? This data is fairly hard to collect so I have relied on what is available publicly. Let’s jump into the data.

Google Trends

There seems to be increased interest in moving back to India in the last five years. The below chart shows the monthly average of traffic for the term “move to India” filtered down to results from the US. Of course, this does not mean that people are moving back but at the very least searching for this term.

Source: Google Trends

Surveys

According to a recent survey, >60% of NRIs from US, UK, Canada, Australia & Singapore are considering returning to India after retirement. The survey only talks about people retiring in India but is still an indicator of interest.

Social Media

I have been following multiple social media platforms for the last 4-5 years to get a sense of this trend of moving back to India.  Just a cursory search on Google, Facebook groups and professional networking platforms such as LinkedIn, Blind and Reddit will reveal an uptick in posts about people moving back to India. I have observed this uptick mostly post-COVID. Also, if you observe the reactions to these posts you will note that people are more open to considering and even recommending this as an option rather than completely dismissing it. 

When I announced our plans to move back to India in 2021 on Linkedin, I got a bunch of DMs from my network asking for advice on 1) why I did it 2) whether they should do it 3) how to make this transition. This is when I realized that the number of people in this dilemma are far larger than I expected.

I recently ran a poll on Linkedin within my network asking the following question with a few options about moving back to India. The results would have been very surprising five years ago, but knowing what I know so far the results (from the limited sample size from my network) seem to be in line with expectations.

Results

Takeaways

• Only 23% of respondents have decided never to move back to India.
• Of the people who have decided, 70% of respondents have decided to move back to India at some point.

Granted that the majority of people who are undecided will most likely never move back. I also think that deciding to move back and actually moving back are completely different decisions and require a lot of conviction to go through with it. Make of the data what you will, but to me, it is clear that there has never been a time when so many people are considering moving back to India. India continues to send a record number of students to other countries. There is also no denying the fact that Indians are also giving up their citizenship and settling abroad in record numbers. While most people will not move back to India, I do believe more people have moved back out of choice in the last 5 years than at any other time in history. This number is only set to go up in the future.

So, should you move back because so many people are moving back? Of course not. Moving back is not the right decision for a lot of people. But should you not move back because so many people have told you not to? You probably have your answer now. Do what you think is right for YOU.