More than 2.25 lakh Indians renounced their citizenship in 2022, the highest in the last 12 years, government data showed on Thursday. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar presented the data in the Rajya Sabha in response to a question by Aam Aadmi Party MP Narain Dass Gupta.

Jaishankar told Parliament that 2,25,620 persons gave up Indian citizenship in 2022, up from 1,63,370, who had relinquished citizenship in 2021.

In the last decade, the number of persons who gave up Indian citizenship ranged between 1,20,923 in 2012 to 1,44,017 in 2019. The figure dropped sharply to 85,256 in 2020, possibly due to the coronavirus pandemic.

A total of 16,63,440 Indians have renounced citizenship since 2011, the data showed.

In his reply, Jaishankar’s listed 135 countries whose citizenship Indians have acquired in the past three years. However, it did not provide a country-wise breakup of the numbers.

In response to a separate question by the AAP MP, Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan said that there was no specific data on the number of businesspersons and professionals who have settled abroad in the last four years.

“The government has brought about a transformational change in its engagement with the Indian diaspora,” Muraleedharan told the Rajya Sabha. “A successful, prosperous, and influential diaspora is an asset for India. India stands to gain a lot from tapping its diaspora networks and productive utilization of the soft power that comes from having such a flourishing diaspora.”