The Indian diaspora as a global economic network

The Ministry of External Affairs counted 37,280,845 overseas Indians in January 2026: 17,760,528 non-resident Indian citizens and 19,520,317 persons of Indian origin. The stock is the starting fact. The research is what people do with a passport, a job and a family.

The map is several histories

On that table the United States holds 6.08 million, the United Arab Emirates 4.34 million, Canada 3.25 million, Malaysia 2.90 million, Saudi Arabia 2.75 million, South Africa 1.80 million, the United Kingdom 1.28 million, Australia 0.85 million and Singapore 0.48 million. Gulf rows are mostly citizens on contract. Malaysia and South Africa are mostly settled persons of Indian origin. North America now holds both. A Caribbean or East African family and a nurse in the Gulf are inside one ministry total and outside one another’s legal life.

Work is the network

The economic content is employment and ownership. Gulf labour runs from a construction site to a hospital and a trading company. American and British Indians are concentrated in technology, medicine, finance and universities, beside ordinary small business. Canada and Australia mix skilled visas with students. Singapore uses Indian professionals inside a booking centre. Malaysian Indians are a domestic minority with a political history of their own, settled over generations rather than posted on a contract.

Firms close the loop. Indian companies employ people in these countries, and people from these countries found or staff firms that sell back into India. Training, taste, film, food and temples move without appearing in a balance of payments. An account of the network needs several balance sheets, not a single remittance line.

Transfers are large, and partial

Net transfers were US$66.8 billion in April–August 2026. Private transfers were US$103.2 billion in April–December 2025. Both windows are incomplete, and both help finance a goods deficit. Households use the money for consumption, school fees, a house, a clinic bill, a family firm. A national total cannot say which. NRI deposits, a portfolio holding and a flat bought under FEMA are further channels, each with its own rule.

Property is where this network is most often oversimplified. An OCI cardholder and an NRI may buy immovable property other than agricultural land, a farmhouse or plantation property, under FEMA 21(R), with funds through permitted banking channels. A person of Indian origin who is neither, and a foreign spouse, sit on different clauses. The diaspora page states the population. The real-estate page states the permission. Neither page is a recommendation to buy.