The Genuine Student Requirement: How Indian Applicants Should Answer the Four Questions, and What Gets Refused
Since 23 March 2024 every student visa application is assessed against the Genuine Student requirement. Home Affairs asks it through questions in the online form, each answered in English in no more than 150 words. For Indian applicants, whose offshore grant rate fell to 59.5% in October–December 2025, these answers carry real weight.
By Leonid Kurza · co-founder of Edumapple · checked
4questions in the form
150 wordsmaximum per answer
59.5%Indian offshore grant rate, Oct–Dec 2025
₹1.7 lakhvisa fee
Writing each answer
Circumstances. Name your family, your current job or study, property or business ties, and who is paying. Specific is better than emotional.
Why this course and provider. Explain how the course follows from your degree or work, why this university over others and over an Indian option, and show you know the city, the cost and the timetable.
Benefit. Describe a realistic job or role after the course, in India or elsewhere, and what the course adds to it.
Other information. Explain gaps of more than two months, changes of field and previous refusals. Silence on a weak point looks worse than an honest explanation.
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Courses your marks and degree qualify for
Tuition and the visa living funds, counted in rupees
Write the answers yourself. Case officers read thousands of identical agent paragraphs; an answer that sounds like you, matches your documents and stays within 150 words does more than a polished template. See the Genuine Student guide.
Questions from Indian students: Genuine Student answers
What are the Genuine Student questions?
Your current circumstances (ties to family, community, work and finances); why this course and this provider in Australia, and what you know about studying and living there; how the course will benefit you; and anything else relevant. Applicants who have held a student visa get an extra question.
Can I attach a separate GS statement?
Home Affairs prefers answers in the form rather than a separate statement.
Does wanting PR count against me?
No. Home Affairs states that future intentions to apply for permanent residence do not count against an applicant under the Genuine Student requirement.
What evidence supports the answers?
Transcripts and certificates, employer details and 12 months of work or business records, offers of a job after the course, tax returns or bank statements, and reasons for not studying at home if a similar course exists.
What makes answers fail?
Generic text copied from agent templates, a course unrelated to past study or work without explanation, gaps not accounted for, and answers that contradict the documents.
