Indians Break Records With Over Rs 8,000 Crore Spent On Foreign Travel Despite Global Uncertainty

Indians have spent a record $10 billion (around Rs 8,000 crore) in overseas travel in the first nine months of fiscal year 2022-2023, amid uncertainty around the world.

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What RBI's data suggests

As per the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data, between April and December 2022, Indians splurged $9,947 million, surpassing the previous record of $7 billion before the pandemic, according to a Times of India report.

Indians shelled out $1,137 million on travel in December 2022 alone, as per the RBI data.

After taking into account the foreign exchange spent on education, maintenance of relatives, gifts and investments, Indians have sent out $19,354 million during the current financial year. This is close to the $19,610 million sent abroad in entire FY22, which was a record year for remittances.

As per the report, Indians are now spending nearly $2 billion on a monthly average as against less than a billion dollars in remittances until FY18.

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Tax collected on money sent overseas hiked

The Indian government has proposed to sharply increase the tax collected at source (TCS) rate on money sent overseas under the Liberalised Remittance Scheme to 20 percent from 5 percent in the latest budget.

For the benefit of students studying abroad and those opting for medical treatment, the TCS rate has been kept untouched at 5 percent of the amount remitted.But investments, gifts, and foreign tours exceeding ?700,000 in a year would be impacted starting July 1, 2023.

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Indians and global travel

More than 1.8 crore Indians travelled outside the country between January 2022 and November 2022, compared to 77.2 lakh in the whole of 2021, data from MHA’s Bureau of Immigration (BoI) showed.

The number went up by more than 137 per cent compared to last year (2021). However the number is yet to reach pre-pandemic levels, except for the number of students. The data on Indians’ departure and arrival is maintained by BoI by capturing the purpose of travel manually.

As per BoI, the record is based on either the verbal disclosure of passengers or the type of visa of the destination country produced at the time of immigration clearance.