Ask HN: Why so many Indians work in US/Australia instead of India?
Is it more prestigious to work in Western countries than India?
India sort of has racial strains of people, which, I think, correlate kind of with geography, or used to. They're often revealed by a person's family name. These groups have distinct visual differences (skin tone, hair patterns, etc.) and cultural differences. Some would argue that intelligence is a factor as well. Over time in India these divisions became a sort of class system where a fairer-skinned class (or 'caste') ended up being dominant over others. This is reflected most obviously in their media, where light skinned people dominate in film and advertising. There is to this day prejudice along these lines, where those in a "low caste" are discriminated against, and cross-caste upwards mobility is discouraged, and this manifests as bullying, oppression limitations and prejudice against such people in matters of work, education, opportunities, love, etc. Things are improving a bit, but they're by no means good yet.
I have directly seen this myself, where we hired one person from the high caste and some who weren't, and she seemingly naturally started to boss those people around in a rather direct (she was not management) and rude way that others in our company did not do and they kind of went with it, which was upsetting to see.
Obviously there are a number of Indian expatriates everywhere so this thing is difficult to escape I imagine, but I would guess Indians who were born into a low caste may like to take advantage of the fact that many western countries would frown upon workplace discrimination and try and have a neutral life experience away from India, which is still struggling with this issue.
Frustratingly for me, the west doesn't really speak of this, and doesn't offer training to people so they can try and help or support people who may be struggling with these issues.
The market for highly skilled people is global and people will prefer to work in places with higher wages, better living conditions and quality of life.
English education and familiarity with democratic political system makes the US, Britain, Singapore, Australia and other countries relatively more attractive than other countries at the same income level.
Tldr: money makes the world go round / no man is in a well.
Interestingly, yesterday I was watching[0] an Indian journalist analyse the Lancet report related to effects of population growth on various countries. He was analysing it from India's perspective. None the less it is very interesting analysis and provides some answers to your question.