India has ranked poorly in the 2024 Passport Rankings by La Vida coming in at a lowly 152nd out of a global list of 199 countries.
Visa Free Travel with Indian Passport
The Indian passport this year offers visa free travel to 75 countries and territories worldwide. But what might seem like a reasonable number for visa-free access is deceiving. The “quality” of those destinations as measured by the wealth or GDP of those countries is just 8.8% of total Global Wealth. The largest destination visa-free for Indian passport holders was Indonesia at $1.04bn GDP followed by Nigeria at $397m.
Second Citizenship through Investment
For many nationalities improving travel connections through the acquistion of a second citizenship and passport through citizenship investment is perfectly possible. However in the case of India it is more restrictive as dual citizenship is not allowed. Figures from Statista reveal that a staggering 1.8 million people renounced their Indian citizenship in 2022. The number of people giving up their Indian citizenship had doubled since two years earlier.
The worldwide rankings produced by La Vida reveal San Marino, Japan and Singapore as the top three passports worldwide all offering access to over 95% of global wealth for their citizens. Countries fairing worse than India include Bangladesh in 189th position at 3.5% and Pakistan in 194th position with just 2.2%.