BENGALURU -- Siddaling Pujari says that his family in the hinterlands of southern India now marvels when he calls home to show off his command of a language he didn't speak until a few months ago -- German.

The 26-year-old isn't learning the language of Goethe for fun. He is studying full-time in a crowded Bengaluru classroom to join the growing ranks of young Indians opting to try their luck working and studying in the European Union. For many, immigration restrictions have choked off opportunities in the traditional destinations of the U.S., Canada and the Pujari quit his job as a nurse at a hospital in his home village, 500 kilometers from Bengaluru, after people who went to his college who are now in Germany told him well-paid nursing jobs are abundant there.

Monthly salaries of roughly $3,500 and scheduled rest days and leave are a big draw, Pujari told Nikkei Asia. At his old job, he made $125 a month and saw nurses work for weeks without a break.

"It has been tough ... there were times I felt like giving up but I couldn't, because a lot is riding on my success," said Pujari, who has borrowed money to cover his living costs and aims to support his family long-term. Aside from a smattering of English, the only language he knows is his native Kannada, the official tongue of Karnataka province, of which Bengaluru is the capital.

Siddaling Pujari, pictured at the Yelahanka Language Institute. Pujari quit his job at a hospital in his home village 500 kilometers from Bengaluru and aims to work as a nurse in Germany.

Doubts now swirl over the future of immigration policy in EU countries like Germany as far-right political movements gain traction But Indian government estimates show the Indian diaspora in the EU soared 26% in the two years up to January 2026, at 1.7 million people. The diaspora in the U.S. and Canada grew about 12% and 13%, respectively, while it shrank 31% in the U.K., the estimates show.

The growth in Indians moving to the EU comes as the European Labour Authority (ELA), an EU agency, noted that at least one country reported labor shortages in 97% of 436 selected occupations last year, with "widespread" shortages across 24 categories including doctors, nurses and electrical engineers.

The shortages could worsen as the EU ages -- according to official estimates, the working age population dropped from 67% in 2010 to 63.7% in 2025, and is set to hit 57.4% in 2050.

See also Indian expats in Germany unnerved by far-right AfD's electoral gains India, meanwhile, is teeming with millions of potential candidates scrambling for jobs as the world's sixth-biggest economy struggles to create enough private sector employment for its vast population and competition for government careers spirals ever higher.

A vast majority of these candidates are educated youth, with a report by Azim Premji University in June estimating that the number of unemployed graduates in the South Asian nation soared nearly fourfold to about 11 million between 2004 and 2023.

Experts say the EU and India complement each other the former is labor-starved and the latter is struggling to support its surplus of workers.

"It might sound paradoxical, but India is one of the world's fastest-growing large economies while at the same time it generates more people who are both willing and able to pursue opportunities abroad," said David Kipp, an associate at think tank Stiftung Wissenschaft and Politik (SWP).

Indian nurses recruited to care for the elderly are welcomed at a facility in Schwielowsee, Brandenburg, Germany.

"In the case of India, the central issue is unemployment and underemployment, as well as a gap between the aspirations and qualifications of a rapidly growing workforce and the quality and number of jobs available, which is why emigrating is a pathway for upward social mobility, which has grown historically," Kipp said.

Aging, along with "skill mismatches and problems with the attractiveness of particular occupations," are some of the factors driving the EU to open up its borders to foreign workers, according to Kipp.

In contrast to the tightening of immigration rules elsewhere in the West, foreigners who have lived legally in any EU country continuously for five years become eligible for "long-term residence status." That entails equal treatment with locals and the right to live in other EU countries for more than three months.

New Delhi boosted ties with the EU as a bloc in January byg a labor mobility pact. India has similar agreements with 26 individual countries, 15 of them signed since 2021. Among the latter were deals signed separately with EU countries like Germany and Italy.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, center, meets with European Council President Antonio Luis Santos da Costa, left, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen ahead ofg an India-EU trade deal in New Delhi on Jan. 27.

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar recently said several other such deals are being negotiated.

"India's vision for mobility is not limited to facilitating overseas employment opportunities," the minister said, speaking in June at a New Delhi event called the Human Mobility Partnership Forum. "We in fact view mobility as a very important pillar of international cooperation." Student enrolments reflect the demographic shift underway. Indian student enrolments in the U.S. dropped 13% on the year in 2024 to 204,058, while the fall was steeper for Australia and Canada at about 28% and 41%, respectively, according to think tank Observer Research Foundation (ORF).

Meanwhile, enrolments in Germany jumped 49%, albeit to a much smaller 34,702. Sharanya, who goes by her first name, wanted to enroll in a program encompassing liberal arts and physics, but such courses were scarce in India.

"I thought about the U.S. initially, and no denying that for education, the U.S. is a great option," Sharanya told Nikkei Asia. "But given the visa situation (in the U.S.), I didn't want to take that risk, and that the tuition fee in Europe was also lower helped." She went on to enroll at a university in the Netherlands.

Europe, she said, offers a better shot at an uncomplicated stay for a long time, which supports her plans to pursue a doctorate and eventually research. But she is open to living elsewhere if a lucrative opportunity arises. "Europe is great, but I will go wherever there are opportunities," she said.

Arpan Tulsyan, a senior research fellow at ORF, said the pattern underscores the changing demographics of outbound students, which about a decade or two ago largely comprised those from wealthier families for whom "international exposure was more important than return on investments." But that mix is changing as soaring middle-class aspirations have families willing to stretch themselves thin to fund an overseas education.

"It is the middle class families taking student loans that is the largest cohort now, and for them it is a very practical choice -- they want return on investments," Tulsyan said.

Pujari, top right, joins students during a classroom session at TERN Group's Yelahanka Language Institute in Bengaluru on Sept. 29. For some, the lower salaries on offer in key sectors in the EU compared with the U.S. are a dampener.

SWP associate Kipp concedes there is a gap, particularly in "sectors such as technology, [where] the U.S. salaries, career opportunities, venture-capital ecosystems and the scale of companies can still be difficult for European economies to match." "Europe's comparative advantages are somewhat different -- social protection, work-life balance, political stability, relatively affordable higher education in countries such as Germany, and increasingly clear routes from education into employment and permanent residence," he said.

But there are chances that Indian workers, particularly in lower-skilled occupations, could get caught in the vortex of anti-immigration sentiments that have swept Europe of late.

Claire Kumar, senior research fellow at think tank ODI Europe, says much of the negative rhetoric is targeted at illegal migration, but that those with legitimate work permits end up being collateral damage to the "negativity around asylum and illegal migration." "And suddenly, all kinds of migration are being questioned," she said, adding that it's "a sort of paradox" that the "domestic audience here has been primed by policymakers over many years to prefer the high skilled, and to fear low-skilled competition," given that locals are reluctant to join the relatively low-paying sectors including agriculture, construction and elderly care.

In Bengaluru, nurse Pujari is six months into classes provided free of charge by recruitment company TERN Group, which connects its students with employers in Europe. He and his fellow students know fluent German will be essential for work there, regardless of visa conditions or life experiences.

"I am definitely looking forward to better working conditions," Pujari said. "But I also want to travel to the Bavarian Alps, and some day Switzerland, places I have also seen in movies." People participate in an anti-immigrant protest in Portsmouth, England, on Sept. 12. For TERN Group Chief Executive Avinav Nigam, the hesitancy of some native European citizens to take on comparatively low-paying work is an opportunity.

His company has already recruited healthcare professionals and technicians for German companies, and currently has plans to expand into Italy and Denmark. Nigam feels demand for blue- and gray-collar workers is only set to soar as aspirational European natives vie for white-collar jobs.

Most of the jobs they shun can be managed with basic linguistic proficiency, making foreign workers a good fit. "The challenge in non-English speaking countries is that it is not easy to integrate and grow without a very high command over the language, particularly for senior roles, because people need to understand and trust you," Nigam said. "But in the case of several blue- and gray-collar roles, the work speaks louder than your words, so the ... fit is much higher." A Yelahanka Language Institute student's notebook. India is teeming with millions of potential candidates scrambling for jobs as the world's sixth-biggest economy struggles to create enough private sector employment for its vast population.

Martin Ruhs, professor of migration studies at the European University Institute, sees a slowing EU economy as a bigger risk to Indians' European dreams than anti-immigration rhetoric. And the economy hasn't exactly been galloping: It expanded 1.2% in the April-June quarter, slower than the 2.1% in the U.S., as well as its own 1.5% growth in the same period last year.

"There's no doubt that if there's an economic downturn (in the EU), or stagnant growth, then some industries will suffer and labor demands will decline, and that will impact migration," Ruhs said.

Still, as a second-year student of AI at an Amsterdam college, Eeshika Mukherjee isn't losing sleep over jobs just yet.

Mukherjee, who landed in Amsterdam in August last year, following in the footsteps of a couple of other family friends, said the nearly 150,000 euros ($170,000) she budgeted for tuition and living expenses for three years is "absolutely worth it." The sum is nearly three times what she would have spent for an engineering degree back home in Bengaluru.

A student speaks with an adviser at the KC Overseas Education study abroad consultancy center in Bengaluru on Sept. 29.

Mukherjee says living abroad has boosted her confidence about navigating life on her own and brought her closer to diverse cultures. "The academic pressure in India is huge, and it starts with the entrance exams that are highly competitive," Mukherjee said. "But here the only unusual paper is perhaps psychology, but that is also to help us use AI to work like human beings." Mukherjee said she is hopeful of finding a job in Europe but is open to working anywhere, including India.

"What I see around me is that smart people with good scores are still getting jobs in Europe," she said. "It's difficult to predict the situation two years down the line, so it's nice to work here, but, okay if not, because I will at least go back with tons of good experiences and memories." But for Menorca Chaturvedi, the situation is not as flexible. After living in Germany and Switzerland for one and a half decades, first as a postgraduate student and now as a pharmaceuticals executive in the German city of Mainz, a return to India would require adjustments of epic proportions.

That would take away her late-night solitary walks along the Rhine river -- Chaturvedi feels Germany is far safer than India for women -- and subject her to constant scrutiny, contrary to Germany where "nobody cares about how you look or dress up, or don't, unlike India where people are out there to judge you." Chaturvedi said a lack of a professional network in India, a consequence of living abroad for years, would scuttle her chances in a job hunt. Also, there are fewer opportunities in drug discovery, her field of work.

A classroom study session at Yelahanka Language Institute in Bengaluru on Sept. 29. "It's a wait and watch because the job market elsewhere is also not booming," Chaturvedi said. Back in Bengaluru, Pujari, the nurse, said he's aware that the rapidly shifting economic and political dynamics of the EU and Germany could thwart his plans. But the labor shortage there has him hopeful of making the cut before the gates close.

"Whatever happens, they will still need nurses," Pujari said. "So no way I am not going."