Immigration New Zealand says it is now turning down more than half the study visa applications it receives from India, while the refusal rate for Bangladesh remains about 70 per cent.
Scoop Independent News reports that Immigration New Zealand director visa, Celia Coombies, told RNZ fake work experience and bogus qualifications were contributing to the high decline rates.
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RNZ reported last week that refusals for prospective full-fee students from Bangladesh had spiked to 70 per cent in the past three months and to 39 per cent for applicants from India, New Zealand’s second-biggest source of students after China.
Coombes said more people were trying to study in the country because of its migration and study visa settings and because other countries were limiting their intakes.
“This time last year, Bangladesh was not even in the top 10 countries for New Zealand, but by May, April in 2026, within the space of four or five months, it was the third highest volume coming into the immigration system,” she said.
Coombes said some of the applications included fake documents or information.
“One of the ones that has risen to prominence recently is the use of recycled bank documents. So one person would have genuine funds with genuine documents and then an agent reuses that information for multiple other students,” she said.
Coombes said similar problems were detected in applications from other countries including India, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan.
