Indian State Emigration Patterns

What this research found

Why does a handful of Indian states supply most of the country's emigrants? A panel covering 20 major states from 2010 to 2023 was assembled and regressed on economic, social and diaspora-network predictors. Network factors — remittances per capita and diaspora strength — account for 56.5% of the variation in emigration rates on their own, against 10.3% for economic factors and 0.4% for social ones, with all predictors together reaching 78.4%. Emigration rises with state wealth rather than falling with it, which the analysis attributes to chain migration: leaving costs money and depends on contacts already abroad.

• Emigration from the 20 states studied grew 151.6% between 2010 and 2023, from 0.88 million to 2.23 million people a year. Every state grew, but rates ranged from Andhra Pradesh at +267% down to Jharkhand at +58%.
• Departures are geographically concentrated. The top five states — Punjab (409,104), Gujarat (261,317), Tamil Nadu (240,752), Kerala (227,120) and Andhra Pradesh (201,860) — account for 60.2% of the 2023 total, and they average a diaspora network strength index of 81.0 against 33.4 for the five lowest-emigration states.
• Grouping predictors by category, diaspora and remittance variables alone explain 56.5% of the variance in emigration rate by adjusted R², economic variables 10.3% and social variables 0.4%. The full model reaches 78.4%.
• Remittances per capita is the strongest single correlate at r = 0.748, followed by diaspora network strength at r = 0.476. Unemployment is only weakly positive at r = 0.264 and GDP per capita weakly negative at r = -0.218, so the data does not describe poverty pushing people out.
• Literacy, higher education enrolment and English proficiency show no significant simple correlation with emigration, and literacy and English proficiency turn significantly negative in the full model (β = -2.427 and -2.814), which the analysis reads as higher-education states retaining skilled workers at home.

How it was done

A panel of 280 state-year observations across 26 variables — 20 major states over 2010 to 2023 — was compiled from Ministry of External Affairs emigration statistics, Reserve Bank of India state-level economic data, the 2024-25 Economic Survey statistical appendix, Census of India figures and World Bank indicators. Annual emigration per 100,000 population was regressed on three groups of predictors: economic (GDP per capita, unemployment rate, agriculture's share of state product), social (literacy rate, higher education enrolment, an English proficiency index) and historical or network (remittances per capita, a diaspora network strength index). Correlations were corrected for multiple comparisons using false discovery rate control, and models were compared by adjusted R², AIC and BIC, first one category at a time and then with all predictors together. The results were rendered as 11 figures and a 16-slide deck.

Data sources

• Ministry of External Affairs NRI/PIO statistics and Indiastat annual emigration data
• Reserve Bank of India Handbook of Statistics on Indian States
• Economic Survey 2024-25 Statistical Appendix
• Census of India (2011 with subsequent estimates)
• World Bank World Development Indicators for India
• International Organization for Migration, Data Needs Assessment Regarding International Migration from India (2024)

Figures from this analysis

Outputs produced

• statistical_summary.json

  Statistical summary

• 01_data_acquisition.py

  Data acquisition

• 02_data_processing.py

  Data processing

• 03_statistical_analysis.py

  Statistical analysis

• 04_create_visualizations.py

  Create visualizations

• implementation_plan.json

  Implementation plan