925,000 Indians took citizenship in OECD countries in five years. Why this is a problem for India's wealth and talent

Nearly 925,000 Indians acquired the citizenship of member nations of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development between 2020 and 2024, as per the OECD's International Migration Outlook 2026, released on Thursday (Nov 12). India is the top source country for new citizens across the 38-member bloc, which includes some of the wealthiest nations. Why does it matter? Because it amounts to a drain of talent and wealth from India.

Better pastures abroad? A sharp increase in Indians giving up citizenship

India outpaced all other source countries by a wide margin in this period. Syria and Mexico came next, with about 590,000 new OECD citizens each. Syrians largely naturalised after arriving as refugees in countries like Germany, while Mexicans mostly naturalised in the US. By contrast, there were no political or strife reasons for most Indians, who naturalised after years of residence on work, study or family visas in the OECD countries.

The 2020-24 figure is a 41 per cent rise from the previous five years, when 650,000 Indians became OECD citizens in 2015-2019. Around 230,000 Indians acquired OECD citizenship in 2024 alone, up from the previous record of 225,000 in 2023.

Indian government data corroborates this, with the Ministry of External Affairs having told Parliament in December 2025 that nearly 900,000 people relinquished Indian citizenship between 2020 and 2024, including about 200,000 in 2024.

Where are Indians taking new citizenship?

Most have headed to English-speaking nations. Canada had the largest share, with about 261,000 Indians becoming Canadian citizens in 2020-2024. Out of these, 87,320 took citizenship in 2024, up from 78,487 in 2023. The US granted citizenship to 48,820 Indians in 2024, Australia to 28,969 and New Zealand to 5,778. The UK saw a significant rise, with 24,888 new Indian-origin citizens, up from 18,319 in 2023.

Also read: Are Indians 'voting with their feet?' Skilled labour emigration grows, but no one's crying 'brain drain'

A drain of wealth for India

India does not allow dual citizenship, so taking a foreign passport means formally surrendering the Indian one. When wealthy Indians leave, their personal wealth, as well as tax revenue and investment capital for India go with them. Over time, their ties to India, including remittance flows, can weaken.

Millionaires are a small but significant part of this outflow. Henley & Partners, using New World Wealth data, estimated that about 5,100 Indian millionaires left the country in 2023 and 4,300 in 2024, with a further 3,500 projected for 2025, taking around $26.2 billion in investable wealth with them that year.

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Some use citizenship-by-investment (CBI) routes, which grants a passport in return for investment or job creation in the host country. In 2020, during the Covid pandemic, Henley & Partners reported a 63 per cent rise over 2019 in enquiries from Indians about residence and citizenship by investment. The firm said, however, that most of its Indian clients opted for residence rather than citizenship.

Between 2022 and 2024, some wealthy Indians turned to fast-track citizenship-by-investment programmes in St Kitts and Nevis, Grenada, Dominica, and Antigua and Barbuda. In the last case, the attraction is visa-free access to the UK and the Schengen area. These Caribbean nations are not OECD members, and do not feature in the OECD figures. Some Indians opted for Turkey, an OECD member, where buying property worth at least $400,000 qualifies for citizenship since June 2022.

Also read: New Income Tax Act from April 1: Buyback taxation, remittance rules & more—Here's what every taxpayers should know

A new brain drain for India

The drain of Indian talent is another consequence of these flows of people. Brain drain is a long-standing feature of Indian emigration. Many who take foreign citizenship are professionals such as doctors, scientists and engineers, seeking better infrastructure, quality of life and higher salaries than they would earn in India. Earlier, such moves were seen as temporary shifts on work visas, which sustained high remittance flows to India. Increasingly, Indians are settling permanently and renouncing their citizenship, a sign that they are shifting their roots overseas. That is a net loss for India.