mumbai the covid19 pandemic foiled the ambitious plans of lakhs of indians who were ready to fly out for an international education in 2020 merely 26 lakh students were issued visas to migrate for studying abroad in contrast to a whopping 59 lakh a year ago the steepest decline came from maharashtra andhra pradesh and punjab states that traditionally see the largest cohorts of aspirants who leave the country for an international degreethe most recent data shows that students who took classes online or deferred admissions by a year were opting for the spring entry in 2021 as the first two months of the year saw 71769 visas being issued for students wanting to study abroad of those again 11790 visas were issued to students from andhra pradesh closely followed by 10166 to those from maharashtrastatewise figures are difficult to ascertain as a student domiciled in one state could have departed from another state stated the bureau of immigration this data as per the issuance of passport shows that the number of indians from various corners had risen from 37 lakh in 2016 to 59 lakh in 2019 with a dip in 2020 triggered by the covid19 pandemic and the sealing of international borders according to a 2014 study hyderabad and mumbai are among the top ten source hometowns of foreign students going to the usfollow tois live blog for latest updates on coronavirusfor six months last year travel was completely closed and once we saw certain countries opening up people were reluctant to move the 2021 numbers were not significantly high in the initial months said education counsellor maria mathais while there used to be an exodus of students for the fall entry and a smaller cohort left for the spring session exit from india in 2020 and 2021 have not been definitive and in sync with the start of the new semesters abroadin the last two years students have moved out at different points in time some pursued their education online and left when they could as universities were flexible regarding entry also some smaller east european nations have not yet opened up explained counsellor karan guptabut over the course of this year counsellors have seen thousands of students leave the country for an international education these visa numbers are definitely going to rise added guptathis year is a double cohort those who deferred admissions last year and the fresh entrants when the eventual tally is drawn up the numbers will be higher than ever before students will be going out all the way up to the first week of october at least for the uk and europe as universities have allowed them to join later too then we expect a huge spike in visa numbers in november and december for entry into australia for february visa counters for australia have not yet opened said counsellor pratibha jain