All higher educational institutions (HEIs) enrolling foreign students are required to register them with the government database, failure to do which will lead to denial of visa.

Instructed by the ministry of education, higher education regulator University Grants Commission has issued a public notice addressed to all HEIs to register themselves and the international students with the government’s Study In India (SII) portal from the current year. The UGC notice said such data would help in smooth admission and completion of visa formalities of the foreign students as well as their safe and proper stay on campus.

Some experts said the move would create a centralised data repository with break-ups on institution- and discipline-wise enrolment and scholarships given by individual institutions.

UGC secretary Manish Joshi issued the notice in September. It also asked all HEIs to appoint compliance officers to ensure all guidelines are adhered to.

“As directed by the Ministry of Education, Department of Higher Education, Government of India, all the Indian Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) are hereby informed that the registration by foreign students seeking admission to HEIs for all courses (short-term and long-term) for the academic year 2025-26 onwards is mandatory and no foreign student would be given a student visa without registering on the Study In India (SII) Portal,” the notice said.

In 2018, the Union government launched the SII scheme to attract foreign students to Indian HEIs. Leading HEIs were made partners under the scheme and they created extra seats for foreign students. The government, through its missions abroad, launched campaigns to encourage students to take admission to these institutions.

Yet the number of foreign students did not increase significantly. According to the All India Survey on Higher Education, India had 49,346 international students in 2019-20, which came down to 48,035 in 2020-21 and 46,878 in 2021-22.

Diptiman Das, former chairman and managing director of EdCIL, said: “The new system will help in collection of detailed country-wise and institution-wise data on foreign students and the courses opted by them. These detailed data will help further the planning of attracting more foreign students to India.”