CIMM – India – February 28, 2024

Key Facts and Figures

• In 2022, India was Canada’s top source country for permanent residents, accounting for 27% of admissions. It was also the top source country for temporary foreign workers (22%) and international students (45%).
• According to the 2021 Census, 1.35M people of Indian origin live in Canada.
• Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) offices in India, during normal operations (pre-pandemic 2019), finalized more than 12,000 applications every week to clients in India (students, businesses, visitors, etc.). Redacted

Key Messages

• Following India's decision redacted the IRCC footprint in India was reduced from 27 to five Canada-based employees. IRCC continues to accept and process applications from India, but this reduction impacts our services and clients.
• It is important to note that the vast majority of applications from India are processed outside of the country, with 89% of India’s applications processed through IRCC’s integrated network.
• The five Canada-based IRCC staff who remain in India are focused on work that requires an in-country presence such as urgent processing, visa printing, risk assessment and overseeing locally-engaged staff and key partners.
• Despite our efforts to redistribute work, it is expected there will be delays in processing applications, response times and returning documents to applicants.
• Canada has a strong connection with Indian citizens and will continue to welcome them, whether they wish to come here to visit, work, study, be reunited with loved ones or hopefully look to call Canada home.

Supplementary Information

• As the situation initially unfolded, the fall in IRCC output in temporary and permanent resident application processing was tempered by support provided by IRCC officers who were initially evacuated to Manila and Canada. This was a temporary measure and redacted.
• Thus far, since September 25, 2023 the IRCC inventory of visa applications for all combined temporary resident lines of business resident in India has grown more than 21% by mid-February 2024.
• While the inventory of students has fallen by 38% since last September, the inventory of temporary resident visas has grown by 26%. Temporary resident visa processing times have improved by 10%; however, overall, study permit processing times have increased by 110%. In addition, the inventory of work permits has grown by 73% from 19,000 since last September and processing times have similarly also increased by more than 98%.
• While the majority of applications from India are processed outside of the country, the exceptions include work permits and also other types of applications retained or transferred back to India redacted.
• The increased processing times for both study and redacted reflect the impact of the reduction of IRCC resources in India since last autumn.
• The inventory of permanent resident applicants resident in India has not changed significantly, increasing by 2% from about 71,000 applications as of September last year.