Study in AustraliaStudent Visa Guidance from Jalandhar

Information on this page was checked against official Australian Government sources on 22 October 2026. Reviewed by Mandeep Sandhu, Sandhu Overseas, Jalandhar. Next scheduled review: January 2027. Australia changed two fundamental rules on 2 October 2026 — they are set out below. Always confirm on the Department of Home Affairs page linked beside each point before you act.

Why students from Jalandhar look at Australia

Australia’s attraction for a Punjabi student has always been the back end rather than the front: generous work rights during study, and a graduate work visa afterwards that India specifically negotiated better terms on. Under the Australia–India Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement, an Indian national with a master’s degree gets three years of post-study work where most other nationalities get two, and an Indian PhD graduate gets four. That is a genuine advantage, it is published by the Department of Home Affairs, and we have yet to see another Jalandhar website mention it.

What has changed, sharply, is the front end. Over the last two years Australia has tightened the genuine student test, raised the money you must show, rewritten the English table, and — three weeks ago — largely closed the door on bringing family and on applying from inside the country. The destination is still open. The route through it is narrower than most people in Punjab believe.

What changed, and when

Sources: Changes to Student visa application rules · Subclass 500 Student visa · Genuine Student requirement.

Can you bring your husband, wife or children?

For most Jalandhar applicants, from 2 October 2026, the answer is no. Only these five categories may include family members:

• A Doctoral (PhD) student — and note that a Master’s by Research does not qualify
• A student sponsored by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade or the Department of Defence
• A holder of a foreign government scholarship that fully funds the studies
• An eligible national of a listed Pacific Island or ASEAN country — India is not on that list
• Certain current Student visa holders who held or applied for a Student visa before 2 October 2026

Where family can be included, they must apply at the same time and from the same location as you. A dependent child must be unmarried and under 18 — and the Department states that a visa cannot be granted to a child who has turned 18 by the time your application is finalised, even if they were 17 when you lodged. Every family member needs health insurance, and those aged 16 and over must meet the character requirement.

If you have a school-age child who can be included, you must add at least AUD 13,502 (approx. ₹8.68 lakh) a year for each child to your financial evidence, on top of their living costs. The Department is blunt that costs vary and that “you are responsible for finding out how much the child’s schooling will cost.”

Applying from inside Australia is largely closed

This matters to students from Punjab who are already overseas, and to anyone being told they can enter on a visitor visa and switch. Sixteen visa subclasses can never be used to lodge a Student visa application inside Australia, and the Department states there are no exemptions to that rule. They include the visitor visas, working holiday visas, the 482 skilled visa and the 485 graduate visa.

A current Student visa holder can still apply onshore in six situations: needing up to twelve extra months to finish at the same provider and the same or higher level; DFAT or Defence sponsorship; applying for a PhD, though again not a Master’s by Research; primary or secondary school study; progressing to a higher AQF level after completing a course; or where the provider defaulted.

The Genuine Student requirement, in practice

Since March 2024 the old Genuine Temporary Entrant test has been replaced by the Genuine Student requirement. Two things about it are worth knowing before you write a word.

First, you answer it inside the online form, not in an attached statement. The Department says it prefers responses in the form rather than a separate GS statement, and there is a 150-word limit per question. Students who arrive at our office with a four-page statement of purpose written for them elsewhere are usually surprised by this.

Second, and this is the paragraph we quote most often: the Department states that the GS requirement “recognises that genuine students may develop skills Australia needs and may later choose to apply for permanent residence. Future intentions of this kind do not count against an applicant under GS.” You do not have to pretend you have never thought about staying.

The four questions cover your current circumstances, why this course with this provider, how the course benefits you, and anything else relevant. The Department adds that it gives more weight to statements supported by evidence — so transcripts, employment letters with a contactable referee, and documentation of your family and economic ties in Punjab carry the answers rather than decorating them. If you have studied in Australia before, your full study history matters, including any study gap of more than two months during an academic year.

Official source: Department of Home Affairs — Genuine Student requirement.

Money you must show

On top of living costs you must show travel money and twelve months of course fees, pro rata if the course is shorter. The Department’s travel guide figure for applicants outside Australia and outside Africa — which covers India — is AUD 2,000 (approx. ₹1.29 lakh). Course fees already paid can be deducted, but only with a receipt or the CoE as evidence.

There is a second route. Instead of showing savings, you can evidence that a parent or partner had a personal annual income of at least AUD 87,856 (approx. ₹56.49 lakh) in the twelve months before you apply, or AUD 102,500 (approx. ₹65.91 lakh) if family members are coming. Both parents’ incomes can be combined.

Where someone else is funding you, you must evidence the relationship, their identity, and any financial support they have given you or another student before. For a lump-sum deposit you must explain the source and how the funds were accumulated — the Department asks for transaction history showing salary credits or a growth pattern. A balance that appears from nowhere a month before lodgement is the single most common weakness we repair in Australian files prepared elsewhere.

Official source: Subclass 500 — gather your documents. These amounts are indexed and change; confirm the current figures before you move money.

English: which table applies to you

Australia has two English tables and the one that applies depends on when you sat the test, not when you apply. The cut-off is 7 August 2025.

Packaging an English course before your main course is what buys the lower threshold: ten weeks or more of ELICOS brings you to the IELTS 5.5 level, twenty weeks or more to 5.0.

• Your test must have been completed within two years before you lodge
• At-home and fully online tests are not accepted — including IELTS Online, OET@Home, CELPIP Online, MET Digital at-home and TOEFL iBT Home Edition
• From 21 January 2026 you must select “Taking TOEFL for Australia” when registering for TOEFL iBT, or the result will not be valid
• TOEFL iBT results from 26 July 2023 to 4 May 2024 are not accepted at all
• If you take LANGUAGECERT Academic, attach both the certificate and the report

Our IELTS guide covers the test itself and how to plan around an intake.

CRICOS, your CoE, and health cover

Official sources: CRICOS — course and institution search · Subclass 500 eligibility.

How the application works, step by step

Official source: Department of Home Affairs — subclass 500, step by step. The visa application charge is indexed annually and published on the Department’s pricing estimator; we do not quote it here.

Working while you study

One rule catches people out every intake: you cannot work in Australia before your course starts, and nor can your family members. There is also a quirk worth knowing — if you are doing a master’s by coursework or a Master’s (Extended), your family members have unlimited work rights while you remain capped at 48 hours a fortnight. Check your actual conditions in your grant letter or through VEVO rather than relying on a general description.

Official source: Subclass 500 — when you have this visa.

After you graduate: the Temporary Graduate visa (subclass 485)

This is where Australia is genuinely better for an Indian national than for most other nationalities, because of the Australia–India Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement.

To qualify you must be aged 35 or under when you apply — raised to under 50 if you are using a master’s by research or a PhD — have held a Student visa in the last six months, hold a recent qualification from a CRICOS-registered course, and, for the Post-Higher Education Work stream, be in Australia when you apply. You also need health insurance for everyone included, evidence that you have applied for an Australian Federal Police check, and English at a higher level than the student visa required: IELTS 6.5 overall with 5.5 in each band, from a test taken in the twelve months immediately before you apply.

A vocational qualification goes through the Post-Vocational Education Work stream instead, which gives up to eighteen months. You cannot change streams after applying, so the choice at lodgement is final.

Official sources: 485 — Post-Higher Education Work stream · Temporary Graduate visa overview.

If your application is refused — or found invalid

Australia distinguishes between two outcomes, and the difference matters enormously.

A refusal comes in writing. The Department states that it will tell you why it refused and whether you have a right to a review. It also states plainly that it will not refund the application charge. Review, where it is available, goes to the Administrative Review Tribunal — the ART. The old Administrative Appeals Tribunal no longer exists, so any page or consultant still talking about “appealing to the AAT” is working from pre-2024 material.

An invalid application is different and worse. If you lodge without a CoE, lodge onshore without meeting an exemption, or include family without meeting an exemption, the application is not accepted at all — and the Department states twice that “invalid decisions cannot be merits reviewed at the ART.” There is nothing to appeal.

Grounds the Department publishes as leading to refusal include failing to provide your health insurance details, failing to provide financial evidence where the checklist requires it — “we may refuse your application without asking you for more information” — and lodging an application without relevant documentation, which “may be refused or delayed”. A previous visa refusal or cancellation, in Australia or anywhere else, is also weighed.

Official sources: Subclass 500 — visa outcome · Review of decisions.

A word about “caps” and processing priority

You will hear a great deal in Jalandhar about Australia capping student numbers. Here is what the Department itself says. Applications are processed under Ministerial Direction 115, which sorts them into three priority levels depending on how full your education provider’s allocation is. And then, in its own words: “A Ministerial Direction is not a visa cap, and it does not set the criteria to approve or refuse a student visa application.” Your priority level affects when your application is picked up, not whether it succeeds.

The practical consequence is about provider choice rather than panic. A provider that has already exceeded its allocation sits in a lower priority band, which affects timing. That is a question worth asking before you accept an offer.

Starting your Australian application from Jalandhar

An Australian file has more hard gates than most: the CoE must be there at lodgement, the OSHC must start from your arrival date, the financial evidence must match whatever the checklist tool says this month, and — now — the family and lodgement-location questions have to be answered before anything else. Miss one and the application is invalid rather than weak.

Jalandhar has a great many immigration offices and the quality varies. Whoever you work with, ask them to show you the Home Affairs page behind any rule they quote. If they tell you your wife can follow you later on a subsequent entrant visa, you have your answer.

How Sandhu Overseas helps

We are an immigration and visa consultancy in Jalandhar. We are not part of the Department of Home Affairs, we do not represent it, and no consultancy can guarantee a visa. What we can do is make sure your file is complete, current and consistent, and that you understand each requirement before you spend money against it.

Other Australia services from our Jalandhar office

This page covers the subclass 500 student visa. If your Australia plan takes a different route, these pages go into each one:

Frequently asked questions