Synopsis
The HPI route is an uncapped two-year UK work visa (three years for those with a PhD) for early career stage graduates. Graduates must have graduated from an eligible international university in the five years immediately before their application.
(This story originally appeared in 
on Jun 01, 2022)
on Jun 01, 2022)LONDON: The UK has been accused of snobbery over a new post-Brexit scheme to attract highly-skilled graduates from the most prestigious overseas universities to work in Britain as it excludes all universities in India.
Not one IIT made it to the lists of “top 50” international universities whose graduates may apply for the “High Potential Individual (HPI)” visa launched in Britain on Monday.
The HPI route is an uncapped two-year UK work visa (three years for those with a PhD) for early career stage graduates. Graduates must have graduated from an eligible international university in the five years immediately before their application.
To be eligible, an institution must have featured in the top 50 of at least two of the three ranking lists produced annually by QS, Times Higher Education and the Academic Ranking of World Universities. Though the scheme is open to anyone regardless of nationality, the lists of eligible universities exclude all universities in Africa, Latin America and South Asia.
The most recent list, for example, consists of universities based mostly in the USA, including Harvard and Yale, with the rest being in China, Europe, Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, Canada and Singapore. An Indian student would have to have been awarded a qualification (be that a bachelor’s degree, master's degree or PhD) from one of these institutions to be eligible to apply.
Indian National Students Association UK president Amit Tiwari said: “In the present day, India supplies the most foreign students to UK universities, so the fact that they are not part of this programme defies logic. Professors and R&D units value graduates from IIT or IIM. UK authorities need to stop treating Indian students like cash cows.”
“It is great that an Indian graduate from one of these top 50 universities can come and work in UK, but, on the other hand, how does this impact the attractiveness of UK universities to study,” said Sanam Arora, chairperson of Indian student body NISAU UK. The list is “Western-centric”, she added. “I would welcome an explanation on the methodology behind the choice of institutions to understand what has stopped top Indian universities like IIT and IIM from making the cut. Hopefully the Indian government will take this up with the UK.”
Ganapati Bhat, who graduated in manufacturing engineering from BMS College of Engineering, Bengaluru University, and is working in London as an enterprise data architect, said: “It is surprising that not a single Indian university or IIT is listed given they are also internationally recognised as elite institutions. Those students studying in IITs will lose out and only those who are able to go somewhere like Harvard, Stanford or those listed, can benefit from this scheme, meaning the UK loses out on Indian talent too. Meanwhile, India wants to retain the best brains to study in India. With this new visa scheme, we can expect that more Indian students might explore US and Europe universities and this will not benefit India's plans to internationalise higher education.”
Phil Baty, chief knowledge officer at The Times Higher Education, said: “This current use of the rankings to determine emigration visas will clearly exclude many highly talented individuals studying at great universities around the world that just happen not to fit with the research-heavy focus of the current global rankings.”
A home office spokesperson said: “The list of the top 50 global institutes has been identified from three of the world's most reliable university rankings lists, which are widely cited by the education system and used in immigration systems globally. Graduates from the listed universities are eligible for the HPI route scheme regardless of nationality. Each of the eligible universities attracts students from across the globe to study. There are several other routes eligible for graduates from other universities, including the graduate, skilled worker and global talent route.”
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