According to international student recruitment data, there are approximately 126,000 Indian students studying abroad in the UK.
Hence, there is no doubt that many of us Indian students have been able to find a thriving Indian community here in the U.K. It is commonplace for us to find national societies hosting cricket match events and samosa socials as well as hundreds of desi supermarket stores scattered across the cities we live in. This is perhaps one of the benefits of India’s vast diaspora because it has given us the opportunity to find a little bit of home everywhere we go.
With all of the Indians coming to the UK, there is now an easy and accessible remedy to being homesick with the Indian takeaway joints scattered across every street and the familiar sound of Hindi, Bengali or Malayalam being heard on public transport.
I chose to come to the UK to study because of the quality of the educational institutions here. I would make an assumption that many other Indian students come to do the same. By being exposed to a wide variety of individuals and global conversations, I have been able to expand my critical engagement with issues that concern me. This is especially relevant to me as a student studying Politics and International Relations.
However, in my experience Indian students or students of Indian descent have often been discriminated against in these academic spaces. Our accents or different colloquial terms will be used as fronts to dismiss our opinions.
To this issue, I urge all my fellow Indian students to not shy away and silence our voices in classrooms but to instead continue taking up space.
It is only through the merging of different perspectives that fruitful education can take place, and our perspective is indispensable for this.
However, a problem that seems to be emerging as more and more of us move abroad to study in the U.K. is a neglect of the pressing issues and concerns of our country. Many of India’s top-scoring, brightest individuals have chosen to move away, studying in the U.K. or other countries and settling here. Many articles and research pieces have concerned themselves with discussing the ‘Brain Drain’ of India. Yet, regardless of whether we choose to settle abroad or return to India- I think it is of utmost importance to remain grounded and connected to our country. Far more than just culturally, it’s important for us to stay involved in the large political and social debates of our country.
It is important for us to remain rooted in the social inequalities that remain prevalent back home and find ways to use our privilege of Western education to give back to the communities that have given us so much.
