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On a warm February morning, Devika, 24, sits with more than 60 classmates in the city of Kochi, in Kerala, southern India, learning how to tell a bogus overseas recruitment agency from a genuine one. Organised by the local government, the training session on safe and legal migration is among a handful of interventions in a country making headlines around the world as undocumented Indian migrants are rounded up and sent back home.
The training could not have been more timely.
On the same day – 5 February – a US military aircraft touched down in Amritsar, Punjab, with 104 undocumented Indians brought back to the country in shackles and handcuffs. Two more US aircraft, carrying another 229, landed on 16 and 17 February. There were also a growing number of reports of “Trump-style” immigration raids targeting Indians in the UK.
Devika and most of the other students of the State Institute of Medical Education and Technology’s college of nursing have just sat their final exams and hope to migrate safely to a western or Middle Eastern country.
But though India has laws that require people applying for jobs abroad or migrating to seek work to get official clearance before they travel, many in the class express their fear of being scammed by fraudulent agencies. Illegal routes feed on the desperation of those looking for a better life and flourish in the cracks in the enforcement of these laws.
“I want to migrate in a truthful and trustworthy way,” says Devika, who learns that authentic agencies will have an overseas recruitment licence from India’s Ministry of External Affairs’ protector of emigrants (POE). Blacklisted companies can be found on an Indian government portal.
Kerala’s Department of Non-Resident Keralites Affairs (Norka) has been offering safe migration training for nearly two decades, but demand for the sessions is soaring. Until two years ago, Norka trained 750 to 1,000 candidates a year, but in 2024 it accepted 2,250.
India is among the top countries sending nurses abroad, helping to fill a worldwide care gap. The World Health Organization predicts a global shortage of 4.5 million nurses in 2030, with western and Middle Eastern countries already feeling the effects on their health systems.
Approximately 640,000 Indian nurses work abroad. While most are employed in the Gulf states, English-speaking countries including Australia, the US, the UK and Canada are also popular destinations.
While Norka’s training sessions are meant for all prospective migrants, so far it has focused on nurses due to the number leaving Kerala for other countries, say officials.
Demand for nursing courses has surged across the country, with many drawn to the profession as a “ready ticket to an overseas career”, says Prof Praveena Kodoth, an expert on migration from the Centre for Development Studies.
Alveena Maria, Devika’s classmate, is surprised to discover that nurses can register as migrant workers free or for a minimal fee with Norka, and also apply for vacancies through two of Kerala’s state recruitment agencies. “My cousin spent 300,000 rupees (£2,700) to get a job as a nurse in Ireland. I may not have to spend so much,” she says.
Kerala set up Norka in 1996, but it has focused more on migration governance in recent years. It works to create diaspora networks, with programmes offering financial and legal aid to migrants, and capital assistance to people who return and wish to set up businesses in India.
In 2021, Norka became the first state agency in India to sign an agreement with the German government for the deployment of healthcare professionals. So far, more than 1,400 Kerala nurses have been recruited, an official says.
K Vasuki, secretary of Norka, says the agency tackled illegal recruitment in the past but “more on a reactive basis”. “As soon as we get complaints, we act. But now we are hoping to create a framework where you take a proactive step,” she says.
But agencies scamming aspiring migrants continue to make headlines in the state. Self-styled migration “consultants” target students by offering them part-time jobs in foreign countries as a step towards permanent residency.
India’s Ministry of External Affairs website – which helps Indian workers find employment abroad – has a list of more than 3,000 “unregistered agencies against which grievances [have been’] received”.
Data from the government’s e-migrate platform shows complaints have been lodged against 208 Kerala agencies. Last year, the state formed a taskforce to combat illegal recruitment. Officials say Norka coordinates with the police to tackle these complaints, and also operates a helpline.
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But Ajith Kolassery, Norka’s chief executive officer, admits it is a challenge.
“My experience is that it’s not easy to take action against these illegal agencies,” he says. “In most of these cases, they are working remotely and outside the ambit of the law-enforcing agencies.”
Nationwide efforts to tackle these scams are being stepped up. In February, a parliamentary panel headed by the MP Sashi Tharoor recommended several measures such as creating awareness through local civil society groups and media outlets in the regions most affected by undocumented migration to ensure that people are fully informed about their rights, and the processes and risks involved. The panel also suggested Indians leaving the country be given basic information at immigration counters.
A new overseas mobility (facilitation and welfare) bill is expected to be put up for public consultation soon. The parliamentary committee report said there was “an urgent need for spreading awareness about safe migration”.
Other regions in India are hoping to emulate the success of Norka’s programme. Officials from northern Punjab, from where some of the highest numbers of undocumented migrants travel to Canada and the US, announced last year that it would adopt the “Kerala model” of migration governance.
In addition to Germany, Norka has agreements with several countries or states, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Austria, Germany, the UK and parts of Canada. Kolassery says they are also in talks with other countries. In December, a representative of the Indian government said Italy planned to recruit 65,000 nurses from Kerala, while Denmark, which has strict immigration policies, has announced it hopes to attract 12,000 nurses from India and the Philippines.
Akhil Alex, 37, works at a psychiatric facility in a small town in Kerala. In 2023, he came across an advertisment for nurses to work in Germany. He didn’t think much of it; he has seen countless such ads over the years. But he decided to respond to this one because it was placed by Norka.
After interviews, he was selected. As part of the job offer, he had to learn to speak German before he could get a contract and visa. “Everything is provided by Norka or the recruiters, including the study materials,” he says.
Alex has completed the preliminaries and is awaiting his work visa. He is hoping for a better work-life balance after a decade of 16-hour shifts for a meagre salary.
He laughs thinking about what he’d like to do on his days off in Germany: “I am a huge football fan. I used to dream that one day I would be sitting in the Allianz Arena to watch Bundesliga matches. Maybe I’ll do that soon.”
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This is an edited version of an article that was first published by the Migration Story, India’s first newsroom to focus on the country’s internal migrant population
