OPINION | India can no longer outsource the dreams of its youth to the West

Indians—especially the middle class escape poor governance, rigid bureaucracy, and low-paying domestic jobs.

The backlash in the United States over Donald Trump's recent remark that America "needs immigration and H-1Bs" revealed a deeper truth: the Western world is no longer eager to welcome India’s talent. Across the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, and even Germany, public sentiment towards skilled migration has turned sharply negative. The era of open opportunities abroad is closing.

For India, this represents more than an employment shock. It marks the end of a model that, for three decades, enabled Indians—especially the middle class—to escape poor governance, rigid bureaucracy, and low-paying domestic jobs. Indian leaders also benefited, avoiding difficult reforms while relying on remittances and evading political consequences, even as the country’s brightest built futures overseas. With that door shutting, India faces a reckoning: without high-paying, innovation-driven jobs at home, rising frustration among young professionals and wider economic knock-on effects could harden into significant political anger.

Yet this disruption opens a new path. India must now focus on building companies, technology, and intellectual property. Success demands global experience and operational skill—resources abundant among millions of Indians who already work abroad as founders, operators, and investors. Some states, such as Karnataka with its IT Policy 2025–30, have recognised this shift. But unless India mobilises its global talent, the moment for genuine economic renewal may slip away.

The Value of Global Indian Talent

India does not simply need “returning talent”; it needs people who possess three critical assets that cannot be created easily at home:

1) Networks of people

Returnees bring well-established professional networks—engineers, investors, researchers, and specialists. These connections have taken decades to form and cannot be replicated quickly within India.

2) Networks of capital

Many who emigrated in the 1990s and 2000s have accumulated wealth and possess deep understanding of how global funding ecosystems operate. Their capital can accelerate domestic innovation dramatically.

3) Reputation banks

Individuals with recognised international credibility provide immediate legitimacy. An Indian startup led by a respected returnee gains trust abroad far more quickly. Without this credibility, Indian companies spend years overcoming scepticism.

This opportunity is finite. A generation of overseas Indians is now considering its next steps. India must give them compelling reasons to make the country their home. While improvements in urban livability, education quality, and economic dynamism are essential, this article focuses on steps that can deliver immediate impact.

Building a National Strategy

# Adopt a Singapore-style talent development model: Singapore’s Economic Development Board (EDB) attracted global talent, institutions, and capital by offering predictability, autonomy, and strong state support. India needs a similar strategy: targeted recruitment of top global Indians, empowered programme managers who can navigate bureaucracy, and a clear mandate to build ecosystems rather than issue symbolic press releases. Singapore succeeded by combining aggressive talent acquisition with high-quality institutions—India continues to do the opposite.

# Launch a National Talent and Innovation Programme (NTIP): India should establish an NTIP aimed at converting its global diaspora into a driver of domestic growth. The programme must offer fast company formation, predictable taxation, and enforceable contracts for returning founders, engineers, and researchers. Its goals should include 10,000 returnee-led firms and one million skilled jobs within five years. NTIP must focus on competitiveness, not sentiment, by building innovation clusters that connect universities, startups, and investors. With transparent governance and measurable outcomes, India can transform brain drain into a powerful brain network.

# Enable seamless relocation of global Indian businesses: If an Indian founder based in California, Singapore, or London wants to relocate their headquarters to India, the process must be transparent, swift, and incentive-driven. This requires removing punitive capital gains taxes, simplifying cross-border asset transfers, and ensuring regulatory clarity. Relocation should feel like expansion—not repatriation—encouraging founders to view India as the natural base for global enterprise.

# Welcome world-class universities: The Middle East has attracted institutions such as Carnegie Mellon, INSEAD, NYU, and Georgetown. Ironically, many of their students are Indian. Instead of exporting money and ambition, India should host such institutions and enable them to build research-driven ecosystems within its borders.

# Prioritise livability as key infrastructure: High-skilled professionals will not move to cities where safety is uncertain, culture is restricted, or public spaces are neglected. India cannot expand technology ecosystems beyond Bengaluru unless it deliberately replicates Bengaluru’s openness, safety, and civic values. Cultural attitudes must also shift: innovation cannot thrive in environments dominated by conformity or moral oversight. A culture that empowers bold ideas is essential if India hopes to attract global talent.

A New Vision for India’s Future

The goal should not merely be to stop Indians from leaving; that is a defensive and limited approach. India should aim to attract global tech professionals—including members of its own diaspora—to strengthen its tech ecosystem. With Western doors closing, India has a rare chance to offer a stable, dynamic, and opportunity-rich alternative.

The next generation of Indian professionals is deciding where to build the most significant phases of their careers. India can either make that choice simple—or let this opportunity slip away. For decades, India sent its talent abroad while pretending it was a strategy. That era is over. The future will be built at home—or it will not be built at all.

(Brigadier Anil Raman (retd) is a Research Fellow at the Takshashila Institution and focuses on US domestic politics and foreign policy.)

(Pradeep Parappil is the co-founder and co-CEO of Cogit-X, an enterprise based in Seattle, that build domain specific AI models.) 

Views are personal and do not represent the stand of this publication.