Recent data shows Australia now has a one million Indian-born community.
For perspective – this growth lifts India above England as Australia’s top overseas country of birth for the first time.
It gets bigger.
There are over 35 million “overseas Indians” living across more than 200 countries according to the Indian government.
Now, through a global movement called “Indiaspora”, Australian Indians can be super connected around the world with these fellow Indian migrants.
No other migration group globally has these numbers and this reach.
A report released in March by Indiaspora found the number of overseas Indians has tripled since 1990.
But the story is not just the number of people.
Overseas Indians have enormous financial clout. Indiaspora estimates the diaspora earns a combined US$730 billion ($1,030 billion) a year, not including business income, stock options, and property holdings.
Indian-origin leaders permeate the highest levels of global corporations, especially in the technology sector.
Indiaspora’s Australia country head, Jai Patel, a good friend and leader of Australia-India business and investment, who also leads KPMG’s India Business Practice, speaks enthusiastically about harnessing the knowledge and experience of “leading lights across India’s global diaspora”.
“Australia’s diaspora provides connections not just to India but to the global diaspora in many other parts of the world,” says Patel. “There is a huge opportunity for us to plug into that.”
Exciting for Australia – but it might take time to reach full potential.
Australia’s Indian diaspora is the “new kid on the block” – Indians have a much longer heritage in countries like the US, Britain and Canada.
With this new generation of switched on Indians, I am sure we will get there.
It could change Australia’s connectivity globally.
Matt Wade, a veteran of good reporting about India, wrote an outstanding analysis for The Age – READ MORE HERE:
Into India 